Digestifier
Sat, 07 Oct 2000 20:05:25 -0700
Linux-Advocacy Digest #510, Volume #29 Sat, 7 Oct 00 23:13:07 EDT
Contents:
Re: Why should anyone prefer Linux to Win2k on the DeskTop ("Osugi Sakae")
Re: Unix rules in Redmond ("Drestin Black")
Re: Unix rules in Redmond ("Drestin Black")
Re: What kind of WinTroll Idiot are you anyway? ("Drestin Black")
Re: What kind of WinTroll Idiot are you anyway? ("Drestin Black")
Re: What kind of WinTroll Idiot are you anyway? ("Drestin Black")
Re: Does anybody offer free Linux access?~! (Mark Hall)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Osugi Sakae" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Why should anyone prefer Linux to Win2k on the DeskTop
Date: Sun, 08 Oct 2000 10:50:11 +0900
In article <8rnmj2$jki$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, "James Stutts"
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> "Osugi Sakae" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:8rmhqn$mhm$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> In article <8rgqs7$o53$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, "James Stutts"
>> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> >
>> > "Osugi Sakae" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
>> > news:8ret4q$9cp$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> >> In article <8re8kn$cjv$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, "James Stutts"
>> >> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> > Quite a few of the distros aren't commercial competitors.
>>
>> Thanks for nit-picking, but whatever do you mean? Are you refering to
>> Debian? Or are you claiming that Red Hat, Caldera, SuSE, et al. don't
>> actually compete?
>>
>
> Distros like Slackware aren't commercial (far better than RH, IMHO).
This is prolly debatable, but just because one or two distros are not
commercial, does that mean the commercial distros do not view them as
competition? Pretend for a minute that that is true. So what? What has it
got to do with anything we were talking about?
>
>> Can I assume from your almost meaningless response that you agree with
>> the rest of the paragraph?
>
> There isn't that much competition between the distros. Due to the
> incompatibilties between them, switching would be a full reinstall. You
> pick one (or a derivative, like Mandrake).
So there is no competition between MS Windows and Apple Mac because
switching would require buying a new computer? No competition between ABC
and NBC because switching would involve changing the channel? I don't buy
that argument. I have personally tried Caldera, SuSE, Red Hat, and
Mandrake. Yes, they all involved a full (re)install, but so what? All the
installs were still easier than a typical MS reinstall, because of the
partitioning scheme that most Linux distros recommend. MS Windows, in a
foolish attempt to be easy, usually ships on computers with one hard disk
and one partition. Thus, any reinstall presents more of a risk of data
loss. Further, Win98 at least has no partitioning options during install.
I wouldn't be surprised to see, in the near future, a linux distro that
includes an option to upgrade from another distro.
<snip>
>> It can't set a precedent if it gets laughed out of court. Oh, you are
>> trying to claim that MS's competitors should not have helped the DOJ,
>> because maybe one day the DOJ will come after them.
>
> Yep. The government is a troublesome servant and fearsome master.
I don't really understand your remark. But I'll tell you, I'll take the US
government over the Japanese one anyday. At least the US thinks that part
of its job is protecting the citizens from the occassional excesses of
greedy businesses. (Firestone tires, anyone?) The Japanese government
seems to think that citizens exist to be fleeced by large (Japanese)
corporations.
>>
>> Even if I believed that, what has that got to do with the willingness
>> of a court to listen to a case involving the "bundling" of third party
>> free (as in GPL) software? Exactly zero, far as I can tell.
>>
>> >> download the whole thing for free anyhow, or easily switch to
>> >> caldera, corel, slackware, etc.
>> >
>> > It isn't quite so easy, unless you enjoy reinstalling your operating
>> > system.
>>
>> Isn't reinstalling the os one of Micro~1's favorite trouble-shooting
>> techniques? And a major source of income for the company?
>
> Why would reinstalling something you already have cause you to buy more?
> How could that be a source of income?
I was refering to upgrades - from 3.1 to 95 to 98 to 98se to me, etc. They
may not qualify as "full reinstalls" but it is still a lot of effort and
expense.
>
>>
>> Maybe you are unaware of this, but switching from one linux distro to
>> another is simple - much easier than switching from Windows to Linux or
>> Mac. It may even be easier than switching from Win98 to WinNT. Unlike
>
> Well, the switch to a Mac requires a hardware change.
Thanks for pointing out the obvious. Do you agree then that switching from
one linux distro to another is easier than switching from windows to
non-windows?
>
>> Windows, Linux usually has (or should have) /home on a separate
>> partition.
>
> You can (I do) have your work files on a seperate partition if you want.
> Just like Unix.
Yes, you can. If you go to the trouble to do it. See the above about
installing various Linux distros. But I'll repeat part - Linux distros
come with software to help you partition the drive(s) when you install
the os. Windows does not - it requires the use of third party software
after the os is installed.
Also, I have heard many semi-advanced Windows users say that they don't
partition their C:\ drive because then it gets too full when you add
programs later. Also, the swap file defaults to the C drive. Certainly,
linux systems can be poorly partitioned - resulting in a full /usr
partition of something like that, but even in that case, the unix file
hierarchy makes it easier to solve a problem like that.
A teacher at a school I went to, poor guy had thirty computers with full c
drives and near empty d drives. All he wanted to do was scandisk, defrag
the c drives, and then repartition with Partition Magic. (These were
computers for the students to use and were loaded up with Win98J and all
sorts of educational software.) We spend a week just trying to defrag one
computer. It failed repeatedly. I suggested freeing up space by moving the
swap file to the d drive. Didn't help. Then we uninstalled a few of the
larger programs. Still failed. (We had already rm'ed all the internet
temp files, and moved as many personal files as possible to d drive.) Even
with over 200 meg free on a 2 gig disk, defrag would not work. (and yes,
we scandisk'ed first).
I don't know what he ended up doing. Poor guy, a week wasted and the first
computer wasn't even done yet. Thirty to do, each one from physically in
front of the computer. Never mind the cost, to the school and ultimately
to the taxpayers, of all that software.
All because the company that made the computers used a really shitty - and
typical - windows partitioning scheme. (And because the
typical-Windows-user teachers who installed a lot of software later did
the typical-windows-user thing and followed all the suggestions during
install. Ie the software suggested c:\Program Files\Company Name\Program
Name\ as the install directory and the teachers didn't know enough to do
override the default.)
>> No problem at all. Unless you really f**ck things up, you won't even
>> have to touch your backups.
>
> You have to merge the /etc, among other things. There's far more too it
> than you seem to think. I've been using Unix-based systems for ten
> years. I used Slackware at kernel revision 0.99. I've been there
> before.
Again, see above about reinstalls. I have installed several distros and
have never had to "merge the /etc" whatever that it.
>> >>
>> >> Anyone who actually paid attention to the court documents in the MS
>> >> anti-trust case can tell you that MS did not get in trouble for
>> >> including IE with windows. Rather, it was because of the lengths to
>> >> which they went to get everyone using IE instead of Netscape. If all
>> >> they wanted to do was improve windows, why not take the WinME
>> >> approach
>> >> - make IE available as a free download, and include it with some bug
>> >> fixes in the next release of
>> >
>> > Perhaps they didn't see the need in making everyone download it?
>> > Other OS providers bundle web browsers. Including at least one that
>> > is written by them (Sun).
>>
>> Perhaps you didn't read the findings of fact? The others are not
>> monopolists who are abusing their monopoly to get their browser on
>> everyone's machine for the express purpose of countering a threat to
>> their monopoly.
>>
>> >> windows? Instead, they spent millions of dollars to get everyone and
>> >> their brothers to use IE _now_. Where is the economic sense in that?
>> >> It was about protecting the applications barrier to entry, plain and
>> >> simple.
>> >
>> > How so? IE is an open framework that is available to be used by any
>> > programmer.
>>
>> Please don't waste your time and my time - if you haven't read the
>> findings of fact from the anti-trust trial, go read them.
>
> I don't accept them as "fact", merely the opinion of a single judge.
Whether you accept them as fact or not is totally irrelevant. They are not
facts as in the "facts" you find in a science book or an encyclopedia.
They are the facts as proven to the judge during the trial through the
evidence and testimony. As such they are considered the facts to be used
in determining guilt or innocence. MS should have done a better job
presenting its case.
Or maybe they are taking the Stormy Weathers approach (from some old law
movie with Judd Nelson(?)): I can't win the case, I just want to draw it
out long enough to cost him money. (Or something like that).
Anyhow, the FoF are considered the true facts of the case until such time
as some higher court overrules them (or whatever is legally necessary to
change them into non-facts). Deal with it. (If MS ends up winning the case
before I die, I promise to deal with it also).
>
>>
>> The answer to your question - and this is in the FoF - is that Netscape
>> Navigator threatened MS's desktop os monopoly by exposing non-Windows
>> API's that programmers could use to write programs that would then be
>> less dependent on the underlying os. They threatened to make the os
>> less important. Remember, Navigator runs on far more platforms than
>> Windows or IE does.
>
> Netscape exposed APIs? Netscape is a monolithic application. What are
> you smoking? Netscape didn't produce Java, you know.
I wish - don't you know drugs are illegal in Japan?
It was quite clearly stated in the FoF that Navigator "exposed non-Windows
API's". If that is false, then MS did an even worse job of arguing its
case than I thought.
>>
>> BTW, are you saying that a Linux programmer could use IE's "open
>> framework" to write programs from Linux (say Red Hat for example)?
>
> Only if IE were ported to Linux.
So let me see here. Navigator is a "monolithic program" that cannot (you
imply) expose API's. Internet Explorer, on the other hand is an open
framework that can be used to write programs - which sounds to this
non-programer like "exposing API's".
So, you expect me to believe that the FoF are totally wrong, and that
Navigator in fact does _not_ expose API's while simultaneously admitting
that IE does expose API's. You can see, I hope, where I would have trouble
believing you over the FoF.
>> >>
>> >> With the market share that MS windows has, and the corresponding
>> >> lack of competition, they have no incentive to include any software
>> >> that they don't absolutely have to. (Also, my not including any
>> >> extra software with
>> >
>> > If the had this level of market share, they could raise prices. They
>> > haven't.
>>
>> I have no data one way of the other. But, are you trying to say that
>> they aren't a monopoly if they don't raise prices? Do you see that that
>> makes no sense? Higher prices are one way that a monopoly might be
>> abused. IE and MS Office are other ways.
>
> IE is free. How is that harming the customer?
You are switching the focus here. You said that they couldn't be a
monopoly since they hadn't raised prices. Now you are asking how a free
program could hurt the consumer. Are you admitting that a monopoly doesn't
have to raise prices to be called a monopoly?
As (some) winvocated are fond of saying, "there is no such thing as a free
lunch". The damage is not directly and immediately dropped upon the
consumers shoulders, rather the damage comes later, in the form of what
could have been. That free program was the club used to beat the
competition to death. Competition that could have brought innovative new
products to market. Competition that could have done a lot of good for the
industry and consumers, but did not, because MS killed them. MS killed
consumer choice. Many people say that IE 5.0 and 5.5 are very good. But
remember that in the time period we are talking about (2-3+ years ago), IE
was not clearly superior to Navigator. Not at all.
Read the FoF - it is quite clear that MS did not give away IE in order to
help consumers. They did it to kill the competition and protect their
monopoly. And that is illegal.
>>
>> >> windows proper, MS gives the OEMs a way to distinguish themselves
>> >> from each other).
>> >>
>> >> And, with the market share that they have, almost any program they
>> >> include
>> >
>> > A more accurate phrase would be "with the enemies they have".
>>
>> What enemies? Don't you mean competitors? I always thought MS didn't
>> understand the difference between the two. Paranoid f**ckers, aren't
>> they? If life is so rough, and their competitors are such meanies, why
>> if it that MS has the bad reputation?
>
> By McNealy's own rhetoric, MS is the enemy.
MS has a track record that makes that easy for people to believe. You
never hear about any company saying "General Foods is our enemy!"
<snip>
> They can't FORCE the world to buy the upgrade. I certainly didn't and
> won't buy it. WinME is a toy. Win2k is actually pretty good.
So, let's see. When did 3.1 come out? (I don't even want to think about
pre-3.1 windows.) I recall using it around 1992, but don't remember
exactly when it came out. For over 8 years, MS has touted their latest
monstrosity as "faster, more stable, and better" (my words), and it is
only now, several oses later that they have one that you will concede is
"actually pretty good". And their home version is "a toy". That doesn't
inspire confidence.
--
Osugi Sakae
a free man
------------------------------
From: "Drestin Black" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Unix rules in Redmond
Date: 7 Oct 2000 20:52:17 -0500
"." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:8rlb6h$ko2$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> In comp.os.linux.advocacy Drestin Black <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
>
> > "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> > news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> >> Drestin Black wrote:
>
> >> > Come on Mike, you know one answer doesn't fit every question.
Obviously
> >> > there are situations where Gig adapters will excel but not in the
> > scenario I
> >> > was discussing/discribing (unless I misunderstood the situation). I'm
> > using
> >> > gig over copper quite happily at two installations - we find multiple
> > NICs
> >> > perform better when there are more users doing large amounts of
> > relatively
> >> > small requests. When the transfers are long/streams the bigger
> > individual
> >> > pipes are the way to go. Depends on usage, I know you know that.
> >>
> >> Only on sucky MS operating systems that have difficult with
> >> context switches.
>
> > If I thought you even knew what you wrote means I would ask you to
explain
> > it but you don't and I won't.
>
> Aw. Dresden doesnt know what a context switch is.
>
Sigh... gee, why not say that I don't know how to write either while you are
at it. Is that your childish game? Anything I say you'll simply write:
"Dresden doesnt know ..." and of course offer NOTHING else and suck youself
off in self-masterbatory congratulations for it?
as I've used benchmarks that measure context switching latency I'm
comfortable enough with the term to know what it means; suspend and save the
hardware state of a running process (like registers, stack pointer, page
table pointers and other things you've never heard of) and load another
process's state - but I'm certain you'll disagree and it won't matter anyway
so... just go get your dick pearced again and leave technical matters to
grow ups
------------------------------
From: "Drestin Black" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Unix rules in Redmond
Date: 7 Oct 2000 20:53:13 -0500
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message news:2cqlr8.9ld.ln@gd2zzx...
> In article <8rlb6h$ko2$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] (.) wrote:
> >
> > Aw. Dresden doesnt know what a context switch is.
>
> With a name like dressed in black and his porn connections I'm
> sure he knows what a context switch is. It has nothing to do
> with computing though. :-)
>
> > Thats sweet.
>
> How apropriate.
when your boyfriend and you are done making out - how about leaving this
forum to hetrosexuals with computing skills
------------------------------
From: "Drestin Black" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy
Subject: Re: What kind of WinTroll Idiot are you anyway?
Date: 7 Oct 2000 20:55:19 -0500
"." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:8rbsck$29bm$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> In comp.os.linux.advocacy Mike Byrns <"mike.byrns"@technologist,.com>
wrote:
> > "." wrote:
>
> >> In comp.os.linux.advocacy MH <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >> > Anyone with any experience knows that you either have a
hardware\driver
> >> > problem, or you're lying. Why perpetrate such BS? Does this help your
> >> > precious Linux? It only serves to denigrate the weight of any
assertion you
> >> > make, relegating you to irrelevant. Get a clue.
> >>
> >> 1. I'm not lying.
>
> > OK. You need a new video driver.
>
> Actually I did one better, I traded W2K for windowsME. That driver works.
what you mean is you couldn't figure out a server OS like W2K so loaded up
the dumbed down newbie version and now the defaults worked on your card?
Gawd! I used to think you had half a brain cell, but now I know that was an
exageration.
------------------------------
From: "Drestin Black" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy
Subject: Re: What kind of WinTroll Idiot are you anyway?
Date: 7 Oct 2000 21:27:05 -0500
"Nathaniel Jay Lee" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> I'll break my self-enforced silence this once.
>
> Dresden, you are exactly the type of person I was talking
> about. You are the biggest RAH RAH Microsoft cheerleader
> I have ever heard. You absolutely will never admit to
> there being any fault with any MS product ever. You
> accuse anyone that says anything positive about any
> competing operating system as being full of shit, and you
> basically demonstrate nothing but stupidity and an
> absolute lack of perspective in any post you put out.
And I can see that you only read what you want to and don't understand any
point of view other than your own agenda. I am not MS's biggest fan and I
KNOW they have faults and have written about them and complained about them
as well as reported them etc... I think you are completely wrong in your
assesment. BUT I will point on that this is an advocacy forum for
windows-nt - look up the word. That's what I am doing, advocating it. What I
DO do is identify errors and lies when someone makes them about NT. Why?
Cause I feel like it. Why is it that ANYTHING that defends MS/NT must be BS
because somewhere someone had a problem with it so obviously it must be
broken? Lets not be hypocritical - whens the last time you heard a linux
zealot admit problems in the kernel? Amazing how MS is criticized for
putting ANYTHING in kernel space but when RH finds the only way it can beat
IIS performance is to do the same thing with Tux - suddenly it's not only ok
but the right way. That kinda of silliness is what drives me. My perspective
I save for other forums where there is actually a balanced and technically
sound presence - here, it's fighting the uninformed fudsters - sometimes you
do have to jump up and down to get hear above the din.
>
> Especially in your tirade in the thread about Nvidia
> drivers. I know of a lot of people on both OSes that have
> problem with the NVIDIA drivers, why are you the only
> person that hasn't heard these complaints. I can't even
> use the 'official' NVIDIA driver under Linux because it's
> 'kernel-space enhancements' lock up X constantly (although
> why it doesn't cause a kernel dump I don't know). I won't
> lie and say I have any experience with NT or 9x with this
> card, but people that have 'actual' experience say they
> see some of the same sort of behavior under Windows. So
> why are you so fucking ignorant of all the complaints?
> It's even been reported in Maximum PC and some of what I'm
> sure are your favorite magazines, the Ziff-Davis Microsoft
> cheerleaders.
No, see, you misunderstand and don't read carefully enough. I make no claim
that the drivers are perfect nor that people have problems with them. I say
that I've had great success and that the vast majority of sites I visit and
reports I've read are positive. I've seen problems (and experienced some)
but I find that the nvidia chipsets and driver are head and shoulders above
the others I've used from ATI and Matrox. What I have been saying is that
choosing between those 3, I would easily declare a victory for nvidia. AND
there are FAR FAR FAR more sites reporting nvidia chipsets/drivers as THE
video to use. Period. Sure, I can find complaints about anything... but I
find fewer for nvidia. You'll have a hard time finding a site that declares
an ATI or Matrox card as "superiour" to an nvidia card - except for the 3dfx
guys (who are like linux guys in many ways). SOOOooo, all I've done is
report that I have personally witnessed far greater satisfaction with one
chipset/driver than others. Why is this so fucking hard to understand? I've
read zillions of complaints about linux but I don't see any of them getting
any weight when we're talking about linux vs windows -- why should I do the
opposite? Besides, everyone knows it's easy to find someone posting a
question about a problem with something rather than someone deciding to post
to say: "Nothing exciting here guys, everything works like it's supposed to.
No problems so I thought I'd just say: continuing to have no problems in
case anyone was wondering." Duh! (then again, maybe linux is so bad that
it's users do have to make such posts to assure others that in fact someone
does get it working right... hmm?)
>
> Oh, and your little joke about MS W2K datacenter being a
> 'heavy-iron' OS that is completely viable (and as far as I
> know it isn't even available yet) is just icing on the
> cake.
well... I'll just reflect your comments below right back at yourself. Did
you even take a second to check before spouting off? Datacenter is not only
available it's already in use in product. Not beta, not RC - in use final
code. And, actually, I do kinda consider DC as the icing on the Windows
cake. As it's the sweetest version of Windows ever. And as I know you can't
possibly have even seen, run or even been near a copy of DC - I find it
funny that you can even assume to make ANY comments about it. That is quite
an assumption. But as usual, you don't seem to need any facts before you go
off on someone...
> Fucking morons like you amaze me. How your brain
> manages to keep enough cells alive to keep you breathing
> is just amazing.
Ahh.. the last refuge of the frustrated...
------------------------------
From: "Drestin Black" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy
Subject: Re: What kind of WinTroll Idiot are you anyway?
Date: 7 Oct 2000 21:34:14 -0500
"Michael Marion" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Nathaniel Jay Lee wrote:
>
> > person that hasn't heard these complaints. I can't even
> > use the 'official' NVIDIA driver under Linux because it's
> > 'kernel-space enhancements' lock up X constantly (although
> > why it doesn't cause a kernel dump I don't know). I won't
> > lie and say I have any experience with NT or 9x with this
> > card, but people that have 'actual' experience say they
> > see some of the same sort of behavior under Windows. So
>
> Yep.. I'm one that had issues under 2k (and even some in 98).. I tried to
> explain to him that there were several hardware configurations tried,
multiple
> drivers, etc.. but he refuses to believe me. What's even sadder is that
> people posted links to pages with many stories of issues with nvidia
drivers..
> and he still denies it.
>
> I think nvidia's hardware rocks.. there drivers, though, have lacked a lot
> recently (until Detonator 3 that is).
sigh - but see, you paint your experience as a blanket statment: "their (not
there) drivers, though, have lacked a lot recently" - I disagree and I say
there is overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Det 3 is the 6th generation
of these drivers - if you think that hardcore graphics addicts are willing
to put up with 5 generations of broken drivers you have not done your
history lessons. Why would these broken drivers fueled the most
successful/popular chipset? You'd think if what you say is true - that
almost everyone has problems with them and they suck - that they shouldn't
have survived so long and become the number 1 video card OEM. Something is
not right here don't you think. Where is the logic? We can assume that you
are right and that everyone is stupid enough to keep buying broken
cards/drivers and that reviewers are just lucky enough to never have
experenced blue screens while doing 96 hour torture tests in Quake III on
three different platforms because on one seems to have posted a success
story to one sites' forum for hardware problems.... or, as I say, they have
a solid combo and that most people experience great success with them and
that generally speaking you just need to figure out what you're doing wrong
and they'll give you the same great performance everyone else is
reporting...
sidenote: via chipsets vs w2k was a known issue - addressed recently. A
failing in the AGP port driver - not sure who's fault actually as I never
use via motherboards.
------------------------------
From: Mark Hall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Does anybody offer free Linux access?~!
Date: Sat, 07 Oct 2000 22:37:17 -0400
In a nutshell...NO!
But then that's probably a good thing. Anyone here use Linuxmail.org?
Now THAT is reliability.
------------------------------
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