Few comments..... I've been using linux as my servers for years already. I admit, I still have one Windows 2003 server, but with Apache+Mysql+PHP+perl AND hardware firewall restricting all but port 80 and 22 to it.
In the desktop usage I've been moving towards linux now for about a year and always have to go back doing things in windows, because I either can not get things running smoothly or I can not find good enough programs to do my daily tasks (for e-mail I use thunderbird as it runs on both worlds.) Also, due to my busy schedule, I do not have time to play with multiple distros to find out the straight-out working one. Kubuntu (Ubuntu with KDE) appears to have promise, but no luck with wireless. It is a strange world! Many of the forementioned windows problems, I've experienced with Linux. Especially Wireless is always a hassle and due to more windows oriented drivers, I've been more successful with windows. Then with some combinations not at all. (Linksys appears to be the most problematic as wireless card, and accesspoint.) I almost wrote a comment earlier about the lack of multiple desktops in windows. Not true at all. Even in the days of win95, there were freeware programs to extend windows desktop to have multiple individual desktops, and also virtual desktops larger than actual screen size. Only limitation for this was a videocards and low amount of memory in them. Today, all you need is a cheapy nVidia videocard and nVidia drivers. One of my biggest problems while moving towards Linux in my desktop machine was *spanning* dual screen configuration. (I'm still dreaming for a laptop with dual screen setup, which technically should not be too difficult as there is already one hinge for the main screen.) With my desktop machine It took me copious attempts to follow the instructions and hints from the web in order to make it work. (Finally I RTFM myself and got it working.) Windows drivers for this are far superior. Dremweaver as my main tool for developing webstuff, I still find Quanta lacking many good features. For writing PHP, it is far better than Dreamweaver, but the ease of use in WYSIWYG side is still far behind. This past christmas time I was on the vacation and I had only Linux in my laptop. I tried to do a minor modification to one of my customers website with Quanta, and after couple of hours, I ended up downloading and installing Dreamweaver trial copy to my friends windows box and did the job in 15 minutes. I'm exited to see if all the promises for crossover office 5.x are true. Even though I've never (I mean never!) had a virus infestation on my windows machine, I find it annoying to reboot after every minor update. And due to cluttering of windows registry, I need to do a wipe + clean install about every 2 years. Most virus problems (including their distribution) and spyware etc. are due to oblivious and ingnorant people who barely know how to turn the machine on. (Do they live in your neighborhood? heh! Out of 4 wireless accesspoints my machine finds in my apartment building, mine is the only one with encryption.) All-n-all. I still find myself using both with the desire of dropping windows alltogether. However, it does not happen until Linux as desktop is mature enough for me. They both, windows and Linux, have positive and negative sides. Luckily I do not have to pay anything for Windows or basic office applications. I benefit from UNO campuswide licensing. Petri Will Hill wrote: > On Friday 16 September 2005 09:13 pm, Brad Bendily wrote: > >>But, to say "XP is simply unusable" is a statement >>made by a person not it touch with reality. > > > No, I really can't get things done with windows. I'll use it if forced but > I've never had to use XP for more than a few minutes but it's always been > frustrating. > > >>Many millions of people use XP everyday to get their >>business done. > > > People used to live without antibiotics, electricity and running water. It > pains me to see people live that way today. > > People who use XP spend a great deal of their time working around it. Simply > booting XP on the laptop disabled wifi and I've heard of it doing worse > things to others. Most windows users have to resort to email or physical > media to share information because windows networking is so poor. When > things are working right, they have to boot every other day. When things are > not working right, they have to boot multiple times a day. Placekeeping is > difficult on a single screen interface and it's next to impossible through > boot cycles. Having to log back into everything, dig up all of the stuff you > were working on and remember exactly where you were is difficult enough when > It's all right in front of you. > > The amount of stuff they have to learn to make windows do things is > astounding. XP users have to keep up with versions of software to know what > programs play nice and what does not. They also have to learn all sorts of > UI details. The effort I used to put into making one or two windoze > computers work easily translated into five or six free UI including CLI > rudiments because apt takes care of other details for me. I don't have > enough space to write about the world of windows anti virus, firewalls and > "security". > > Is it worth the price? I don't know anyone who would actually buy Office, > for > example. Everyone I know who uses it tells me they got their copy with a new > computer, from work or less reputable places. On it's own, does XP even have > a spell checker? What can you do without that? Honest users will spend > hundreds of dollars on software every few years to feed Microsoft's > outrageous profit margins. The amount of time spent due to poor place > keeping, wipe and reload, daily boots, virus checks and all that has got to > add up to more than a few hundred bucks. The kinds of mistakes that are made > transcribing information from machines that don't communicate with each other > costs even more still. Clicking "I agree" is just priceless. > > >>I've used 95, 98, NT, 2000, and XP >>extensively. > > > My list is dos 3.2, windows 3.1, 95, 98, NT and 2000. My use peaked with 3.1 > and fell off sharply with NT. I've used it at home, in small companies, > large companies and state agencies. The performance has always been poor, > regardless of staffing and support. Desktop machines had all of the above > mentioned problems and "servers" would lose all of your information every > year or so. By contrast, I can still boot up my old XT and read letters and > email from 15 years ago. > > >>They all have thier problems, but I >>wouldn't call any of them "unusable". Now at times, after >>being riddled with viruses or spyware, or just too >>much software installed it gets to a point that it may be "unusable". >>However, after a format/reinstall everything works like normal >>again. > > > You have your view of usable and I have mine. The less I use Microsoft, the > fewer problems I have and the less tolerance I have for those problems when I > see them. It's my opinion that system stability has steadily declined due > to the registry and other broken windows computers on the network. More DRM > will make things worse not better in the windows world. I expect the next > version of windows to be the worst ever and it to make the networks even > noisier and spam filled than ever. > > I was able to use 3.1, 95 and 98 to get things done but I refuse to waste > any > more time with the mess. I can't go back to insecure networking and the > fragmented information isolated computers cause. I can't go back to a daily > boot. I really wish someone had turned me onto emacs back in the late 80s, > so I would not have wasted my time with Word Perfect. It was a waste then > and it's a waste now. > > My view is tempered with several recent negative Windows experiences. Over > the sumer, I had to set up a Windows 2000 box as a data acquisition device. > It had been running windows 98 and was so virused up it would not boot from > any of the three or four Microsoft CD I threw at it. It did boot off a > Debian net install, knoppix, mepis and the Windows 2000 boot floppies which I > used to shake out some of the deamons. You already know about the laptop. > My most recent windows experience was watching a therapy machine crash. It's > a great machine, but they made the mistake of using Microsoft for all 40 of > it's control and calculation computers. > > A ray of sunshine came from talking with that machine's computer tech. He > told me his company and all of the companies were moving toward "Unix", which > is Solaris or Linux. The GE CT scan already uses Solaris and Linux and it > has an excellent reputation. > > >>It's like saying that because I had my truck in the shop that >>Dodges are unusable. Which is not true. > > > Indeed that's not true. > > > > _______________________________________________ > General mailing list > [email protected] > http://brlug.net/mailman/listinfo/general_brlug.net >
