On Thu, Jul 29, 2010 at 12:22 AM, J. Moen <j...@jwmoen.com> wrote:
>
>
> I think you got some great answers, with the general theme that Linux is an
> excellent operating system AND people have written native Linux ham programs
> that also are excellent. Bottom line -- hams will be more than happy
> running Linux as their prime operating system.
>
> There was one replier who felt the need to denigrate Windows ("You will be
> rewarded with inexpensive secure software that is very robust and stable.
> Something you never had with Windows and it's what makes Linux great.")
>
> That part is kind of hard to understand. My Win XP SP3 machine has never
> crashed, not even once over these many years. At work, our Vista machines
> never go down, except when Building Maintenance decides to cut power to the
> mains. And I have used wonderfully robust Windows programs for many years.
>
>
You are either very lucky, very careful or you have serious malware and
virus protection running on those machines.
In the 1990's RainForestPuppy disclosed a vulnerability in all versions of
Windows that was so severe that Microsoft had no choice but to respond with
an operating system that literally could not run almost all previously
written Windows software. That operating system was Vista. It's third
incantation is Windows 7 (I count the second version as Vista SP2, the first
version of Vista that actually was stable at all). It looks like Microsoft
may have gotten it right with Windows 7. I like it a lot, but all previous
versions of Windows were either buggy or rife with vulnerabilities, like
needing to run with administrator privilege to install and run most
software.
It's not a secret that Windows systems are swiss cheese because of this
whole group of issues. Closing our eyes to these problems doesn't make them
go away. Running Windows without third party malware or virus protection
will lead you to a disaster in a short amount of time. This is common
knowledge.
When you talk to people that are not experts in running computers, I bet you
suggest to them to make sure their computer protected with virus and malware
protection and that they are up to date and run often.
None of this is necessary with Linux.
I make my living supporting Windows systems for a Fortune 50 company. Tens
of thousands of them. Yes, we keep them generally stable. But not without
the cost of serious firewalling, malware detection, virus protection and
policy administration. And even then, when a Windows system becomes
unstable, our second line of defense after a few minutes of troubleshooting
is to wipe the drive and reinstall, then reinstate just the data. We do this
because it takes far too long to troubleshoot arcane issues and often simply
wastes time. This is virtually never done on our Linux systems.
>
> The fact that Windows is both stable and robust does not mean I think Linux
> isn't. In fact, since I first read about Unix in 1977 and in the 80s played
> with various PC ports of Unix, and later Linux over the years, it's been
> fascinating to see this platform flourish and grow. It IS an excellent
> operating system.
>
>
I'm glad you've had great luck with windows. My experience, as well as most
everyone who runs Windows, is that without external support, it will fall
down quickly and become a victim of malware or viruses. And if you run with
administrative privileges, you have opened the door for anything that
attacks you as a user to also attack the entire system. The very design of
Unix and Linux prevents this kind of issue.
But you did get the general point that expecting Linux or any other
operating system to act like Windows is a poor stance that will make that
operating system disappoint you because it doesn't meet your preconceived
outcome.
