Linux-Advocacy Digest #602, Volume #30 Sat, 2 Dec 00 08:13:03 EST
Contents:
Re: Windoze 2000 - just as shitty as ever ("Erik Funkenbusch")
Re: A Microsoft exodus! (Tore Lund)
Re: Linux is awful ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: OS Sound OFF. (SwifT -)
Re: OS Sound OFF. (Ed Allen)
Re: OS Sound OFF. (Edward Rosten)
Re: Windows review (Edward Rosten)
Re: Windows review (Edward Rosten)
Re: Windoze 2000 - just as shitty as ever ("Ayende Rahien")
Re: A Microsoft exodus! ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: A Microsoft exodus! ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: A Microsoft exodus! ("Aaron R. Kulkis")
Re: WINDOZE is awful (Chas2K)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Erik Funkenbusch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy
Subject: Re: Windoze 2000 - just as shitty as ever
Date: Sat, 2 Dec 2000 03:18:13 -0600
"Alan" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> >> According to trial testimony, IBM was threatened by MS in that if IBM
> >> didn't stop promoting OS2 (or was it LotusNotes, I can't remember)
> >> they would have to pay retail for each copy of Windows 95. Where it is
> >> estimated that most OEMs were paying $35-$40/license, IBM would have
> >> to shell out almost $200 at the time placing it's PC business at a
> >> severe competitive disadvantage.
> >
> >I believe that this was actually in regards to the millions of dollars
IBM
> >owned MS in back Windows 3.1 licenses, not OS/2.
>
> You are correct in that this is the reason MS claimed in order to
> withold the new licensing until the matter of royalties was cleared.
> However, according to the testimony, MS was willing to "forgo" the
> audit provided that IBM stopped their promotion of products that
> competed with MS. In a side note, MS also lost millions in royalties
> on this delay, possibly far more than the disputed amount.
>
> This is a great source of debate with the pro-MS group stating that MS
> was standing for principle and what not, and the Anti-MS group stating
> that it was akin to extortion. The judge decided that MS was acting
> uncompetitively.
IBM was negotiating a new contract. Typically, when one negotiates a new
contract, one looks at past performance. IBM apparently didn't pay it's
bills, thus MS wanted compensation before agreeing to a new contract.
Principles didn't even come into the matter. MS wanted to be compensated
for the licenses they had lost payment on. Allowing IBM to "get away" with
not paying their licenses would have made it difficult for MS to enforce
licenses on anyone else.
Further, the judge made no ruling that the testimony you mentioned was
uncompetitive behavior. Lots of things were testified about at the trial.
An overall ruling does not mean that everything that was testified was
uncompetitive behavior, just that there was enough evidence for the judge to
believe that uncompetitive behavior went on.
> >Windows 95 came out in August of 95. No way did it take IBM 4 months to
get
> >machines out the door. Hell, it'd surprise me if it took more than 2
weeks.
> >Most colleges don't start until late september or early october.
> >
> My college started the third Monday in August that year. And you may
> not recall Win95 required greater system resources (hardware) that
> would have to be ordered. IBM could not just place an order the next
> day for lets say, 1,000,000 RAM chips, 100,000 hard drives, specific
> motherboards. and have them ship overnight. These products had to be
> manufactured, and other OEMs had priority because they ordered first
> because they had their license already.
IBM was well aware of Windows 95 and it's system resources as much as a year
ahead of time. They didn't need their signed licenses to order stock,
especially since OS/2 required similar resources.
------------------------------
From: Tore Lund <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.os.os2.advocacy,comp.unix.advocacy
Subject: Re: A Microsoft exodus!
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 10:03:04 +0100
Someone wrote:
>
> >> "Typing, Fastest. Mrs. Barbara Blackburn of Salem, Oregon can maintain
> >> 150 wpm for 50 min (37,500 key strokes) and attains a speed of 170 wpm
> >> using the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard (DSK) system. Her top speed was
> >> recorded at 212 wpm. Source: Norris McWhirter, ed. (1985), THE GUINNESS
> >> BOOK OF WORLD RECORDS, 23rd US edition, New York: Sterling Publishing
> >> Co., Inc."
Could someone please tell me: roughly how does words/minute translate to
keystrokes/minute? In the good old days when typing was a prized skill,
800 keystrokes/minute was considered a fairly good speed in my
surroundings. But I have no idea what that would mean in terms of
words/minutes.
--
Tore
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Linux is awful
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 10:17:18 GMT
Ok, I have one in favor. Thats good nuf for me. Les go start fights.
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
------------------------------
From: SwifT - <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: OS Sound OFF.
Date: Sat, 2 Dec 2000 11:43:29 +0100
On Sat, 2 Dec 2000, Charlie Ebert wrote:
> Everybody who reads this, sound off with your OS please.
> The one your using or like the most.
> Then the others you use follow.
Like the most: RedHat 6.2
Use the most: FreeBSD 4.2
Use often: Windows 2000 Professional (Testing)
Use less often: Windows 98 SE (I hope to kill -9 it soon :-)
--
SwifT
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Ed Allen)
Subject: Re: OS Sound OFF.
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 10:59:02 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
Charlie Ebert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>Everybody who reads this, sound off with your OS please.
>The one your using or like the most.
>
Linux: Redhat 6.1,6.2,7.0 SuSE 6.4
on the shelf: Slackware,Caldera,Yggdrasil
At work: Win95,Linux-390 (SuSE 7.0)
--
"Whether you think their witnesses are credible or non-credible;
they've admitted monopoly power, they've admitted raising prices to hurt
consumers, they've admitted depriving consumers of choice...
-DAVID BOIES, US Department of Justice
------------------------------
From: Edward Rosten <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: OS Sound OFF.
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 11:48:03 +0000
Charlie Ebert wrote:
>
> Everybody who reads this, sound off with your OS please.
> The one your using or like the most.
RedHat 5.2 upgraded heavily. Soon, my alterations will make it quite
unlike redhat, which is good, because they have some wierd init scripts.
I use DR-DOS for embedded things at the moment.
-Ed
> Then the others you use follow.
>
> Using Debian 2.3 Woody
>
> Others None.
>
> Thanks
>
> Charlie
--
Did you know that the reason that windows steam up in cold | Edward
Rosten
weather is because of all the fish in the atmosphere? | u98ejr
- The Hackenthorpe Book of lies | @
| eng.ox.ac.uk
------------------------------
From: Edward Rosten <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows,comp.os.ms-windows.nt,comp.os.linux,comp.os.linux
Subject: Re: Windows review
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 12:05:05 +0000
Adam Schuetze wrote:
>
> On Fri, 1 Dec 2000 15:06:25 +0200, Ayende Rahien <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >
> > 64MB is a big amount of RAM, even today.
>
> Are you kidding? 64 meg doesn't even come close to what your
> average machine should have these days.
>
> In fact, I can't belive they (oems) keep shafting buyers by selling
> them machines with only 64 MB of ram. Can you say, "bottleneck"?
> They sell you the top-of-the-line cpu's, graphics cards etc..
> but then they give you a puny 64 MB of ram. What use is that?
>
> Extra ram goes a LONG way. I keep seeing people upgrading from
> (for example) pentium 200's to PIII etc.., rather than just
> buying some ram. CPU speed is nice, but a lot of the
> performance lag is from swapping pages of ram to disk and back.
>
> IMO, your average machine (PII-450 --> PIII 500) should have at
> least 256MB of ram, or else your great speedy cpu is just
> idling, waiting for the hard disk.
That really depends on what your doing. The average home user does not
need 256M for word processing, playing games etc. 256M for a PII300 used
for heavy computation is reasonable. But most home users don't do much
heavyweight computation.
> Really though, if you are ever dipping into your swap
> file/partition, you need more ram :)
Not really. Occasionally I go in to swap., sometimes really heavily. But
it's infrequent enough not to upgrade my RAM.
-Ed
--
Did you know that the reason that windows steam up in cold | Edward
Rosten
weather is because of all the fish in the atmosphere? | u98ejr
- The Hackenthorpe Book of lies | @
| eng.ox.ac.uk
------------------------------
From: Edward Rosten <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows,comp.os.ms-windows.nt,comp.os.linux,comp.os.linux
Subject: Re: Windows review
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 12:06:55 +0000
Chris Ahlstrom wrote:
>
> Edward Rosten wrote:
> >
> > The smallest useful Linux distro i've seen fits in 5 floppies. With that
> > you get X, netscape and a few other things. If you go for the 7 floppy
> > version, you get GCC and sendmail as well.
>
> The Linux Router Project aims to get it all on one disk!
But that's only useful for routing :-)
Monkey Linux gives a usuable distro in 5 floppies. It works well as a
general OS on an old computer or as a terminal.
The probelm with it is that it uses UMSDOS not ext2 as the filesystem
(although that's a good thing in some ways) but it makes it slower.
-Ed
--
Did you know that the reason that windows steam up in cold | Edward
Rosten
weather is because of all the fish in the atmosphere? | u98ejr
- The Hackenthorpe Book of lies | @
| eng.ox.ac.uk
------------------------------
From: "Ayende Rahien" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy
Subject: Re: Windoze 2000 - just as shitty as ever
Date: Sat, 2 Dec 2000 13:58:36 +0200
"Chris Ahlstrom" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Ayende Rahien wrote:
> >
> > (MS)IE is not open source.
>
> No, it's open sores. (Just quipping! Don't give me a whipping!)
>
> > But what I'm saying is true for all well-designed software. It should be
> > able to be used without *requiring* you to buy support.
> > Buying support for a product you don't know well is a Good Thing.
Especially
> > something as critical as an OS, such a Linux or FreeBSD.
> > That way you get people who get *paid* because they *know* how to fix
the
> > system to *help* you.
>
> True.
>
> > The problem is that you can usually do *without* buying the support.
>
> Only true for a certain class of intellect, I'm afraid. Like Heinlein
said,
> "Man is essentially a trained ape."
Considerring the level of expertise Linux demand of you, I would say that
it's almost a given that for most of the situations, for most of linux
users, that way would work.
> > Now, assuming that I make a good software, no matter what size it is, I
> > would hope that people can learn to use it without *requiring* my help.
> > Frankly, if I sell support and give the software away, I find myself in
a
> > conflict of interests. On the one hand, one of my definations of good
> > software is that it's easy to use or learn.
> > So I find myself in a troublesome situation, if I GPL the software and
sell
> > support, I've one of two routes to choose, make good software which
won't
> > require much support, those reducing my profits, or make bad software
(not
> > neccecaryily bad as inefficent/ineffective, but bad as in hard to use
and
> > overly complex) and increase my profits.
>
> You'd be surprised at what some programmers will do in the name
> of "job security".
:)
Some examples would be nice, even if only to laugh at or pity at.
> > Since *very* few applications reach the point where I can make good
> > software, GPL it, and trust the fact that I'll have enough users so I
could
> > count on the clueless/careful ones to buy support to pay up the bills.
> > I can also try to sell the application, but how economical would this be
> > with GPLed code? One user buy it, modify it slightly, and release it for
> > free. Who would you go after, two application of exactly the same
quality
> > and usability, but one that cost money, the second is free?
>
> I can go to the RedHat site and download Linux essentially for free,
> and burn my disks. Or I can go order it from them, pay $30, and
> get a nice boxed set in a couple of days. I've done both. I downloaded
> RedHat 6.9.1 or some such, and burned a disk, and it was fast. Soon
> thereafter, RedHat 7 came out, and the download times approached multiple
> days over a cable modem. So I paid for the service of a delivery.
I'm on dialup, and I got it for free, your are spoiled because you've a
cable modem.
www.linuxiso.org & www.redhat.com/mirrors.html are very good in helping you
find places where the download speed will be quite fast.
> > Even worse, IMO, assuming that I GPLed the code, anyone might take it,
> > modify it a little bit, release it as theirs, and make profit out of
*my*
> > work. Both scenarios will affect cause my profits to go down.
>
> That's partly the point. Only those who wish to, for reasons of altruism
> or gratitude, will release their code under the GPL. And, in truth,
> much open-source code is indirectly supported by day jobs.
Which makes OSS a hobby, sadly.
Hobbies are good, some people invest in hobbies more than they invest in
your work, but...
> (Still,
> plenty of people find it convenient to pay for open-source code.)
Not the majority, I'm afraid, and not enough to pay the bills.
> > Are you aware of any company/coder(s) which sell applicaiton which they
> > GPLed and make profit out of it?
> > Any company/coder(s) which GPL their products and make profit out of it?
>
> RedHat, SuSE, etc.
Making profit?
I don't think that RedHat showed any profit yet. I think it lose 15 million
plus just this quarter/year (can't remember).
I don't know about SuSE, but I think it situation is similar.
> > I know this seems like a flame, but I think that those are real concerns
> > when a programmer/company need to decide whatever to GPL their code or
not.
>
> Definitely.
>
> --
> Are you sure you want to read this message?
> Click Okay to continue, and Cancel to okay
> this dialog.
------------------------------
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.os.os2.advocacy,comp.unix.advocacy
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: A Microsoft exodus!
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 11:14:12 GMT
Aaron R. Kulkis writes:
>> Donovan Rebbechi writes:
>>> The movement keys are placed sensibly in vi (hjkl),
>> Which is not intuitive. First-time vi users, if they try to do
> Big fucking deal. NOTHING about computers is "intuitive"
Incorrect; consider the power switch.
>> anything without having had a tutorial, won't get very far because
>> of that "every letter key is a command" approach. Most people
>> expect that pressing a letter key enters that letter into the
>> document they're editing, either overwriting the letter that's
>> already there, or inserting it before the location of the cursor,
>> depending on the default mode of the editor. In my experience,
>> vi is unique in that regard. Are there other editors out there
>> that start off in "every letter key is a command" mode?
> 12 years of posting to USENET, and you're STILL the biggest
> moron I've ever come across.
How ironic. As expected from someone who lacks a logical argument,
you resort to invective. No surprise there.
------------------------------
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.os.os2.advocacy,comp.unix.advocacy
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: A Microsoft exodus!
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 11:19:43 GMT
Aaron R. Kulkis writes:
>>> Alan Baker wrote:
>>>> Aaron R. Kulkis wrote:
>>>>> The only tests that 'demonstrated' superior speed on a Dvorak
>>>>> board were those conducted by Dvorak himself (1943, US Navy).
>>>>>
>>>>> All other trials have failed to reproduce the results.
>>>> <http://www.som.syr.edu/facstaff/dvorak/blackburn.html>
>>>>
>>>> "Typing, Fastest. Mrs. Barbara Blackburn of Salem, Oregon can maintain
>>>> 150 wpm for 50 min (37,500 key strokes) and attains a speed of 170 wpm
>>>> using the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard (DSK) system. Her top speed was
>>>> recorded at 212 wpm. Source: Norris McWhirter, ed. (1985), THE GUINNESS
>>>> BOOK OF WORLD RECORDS, 23rd US edition, New York: Sterling Publishing
>>>> Co., Inc."
>>> Big fucking deal.
>> On the contrary, it represents a trial that did not fail to reproduce
>> the superior speed.
> There is NOTHING to indicate that she could not achieve the same
> speed on a QWERTY keyboard.
On the contrary, there is the 150 wpm speed, which is 20 wpm less than
the speed achieved with the DSK. That is something to indicate that she
could not achieve the same speed on a QWERTY keyboard.
>> It doesn't surprise me that you would try to downplay the significance
>> of evidence that contradicts a claim of yours.
> The choice of ONE PERSON proves nothing, dave.
On the contrary, it represents a trial that did not fail to reproduce
the superior speed. You claimed that "All other trials have failed
to reproduce the results." At best, you can now only claim "all but
one", until such time as additional results are provided about which
you may be unaware.
> The only way to determine which keyboard is better is to take
> two large groups of non-typists and put them through touch-typing
> programs on the two keyboards, where they have exclusive access to
> that keyboard configuration ONLY, with identicla keyboard time,
> ....and then see what happens.
That represents only "a" trial. You claimed that "all other trials"
failed to reproduce the results. It only takes an example of one
to eliminate the validity of the "all" claim.
> Dvorak claims to have done this...but in 55 years NOBODY has
> reproduced his results.
Mrs. Barbara Blackburn apparently did. Do you consider her a "nobody"?
------------------------------
From: "Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.os.os2.advocacy,comp.unix.advocacy
Subject: Re: A Microsoft exodus!
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 07:41:59 -0500
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>
> Aaron R. Kulkis writes:
>
> >> Donovan Rebbechi writes:
>
> >>> The movement keys are placed sensibly in vi (hjkl),
>
> >> Which is not intuitive. First-time vi users, if they try to do
>
> > Big fucking deal. NOTHING about computers is "intuitive"
>
> Incorrect; consider the power switch.
Only to those with previous experience with power switches.
Put a computer in front of a person from a remote village which
has no electrical service, and let's see how "intuitive" the
power switch is.
>
> >> anything without having had a tutorial, won't get very far because
> >> of that "every letter key is a command" approach. Most people
> >> expect that pressing a letter key enters that letter into the
> >> document they're editing, either overwriting the letter that's
> >> already there, or inserting it before the location of the cursor,
> >> depending on the default mode of the editor. In my experience,
> >> vi is unique in that regard. Are there other editors out there
> >> that start off in "every letter key is a command" mode?
>
> > 12 years of posting to USENET, and you're STILL the biggest
> > moron I've ever come across.
>
> How ironic. As expected from someone who lacks a logical argument,
> you resort to invective. No surprise there.
You are a complete shit-for brains who, in 12 years, has still yet
to demonstrate a coherent, rational thought.
--
Aaron R. Kulkis
Unix Systems Engineer
ICQ # 3056642
H: "Having found not one single carbon monoxide leak on the entire
premises, it is my belief, and Willard concurs, that the reason
you folks feel listless and disoriented is simply because
you are lazy, stupid people"
I: Loren Petrich's 2-week stubborn refusal to respond to the
challenge to describe even one philosophical difference
between himself and the communists demonstrates that, in fact,
Loren Petrich is a COMMUNIST ***hole
J: Other knee_jerk reactionaries: billh, david casey, redc1c4,
The retarded sisters: Raunchy (rauni) and Anencephielle (Enielle),
also known as old hags who've hit the wall....
A: The wise man is mocked by fools.
B: Jet Silverman plays the fool and spews out nonsense as a
method of sidetracking discussions which are headed in a
direction that she doesn't like.
C: Jet Silverman claims to have killfiled me.
D: Jet Silverman now follows me from newgroup to newsgroup
...despite (C) above.
E: Jet is not worthy of the time to compose a response until
her behavior improves.
F: Unit_4's "Kook hunt" reminds me of "Jimmy Baker's" harangues against
adultery while concurrently committing adultery with Tammy Hahn.
G: Knackos...you're a retard.
------------------------------
From: Chas2K <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.linux,comp.os.linux.x,comp.os.ms-windows,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,alt.os.linux,alt.os.linux.mandrake
Subject: Re: WINDOZE is awful
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 08:02:16 -0500
> /dev/hda
>
> which kind of sucks since Windows is awful when it comes to multi-boot OS.
>
> - Adam
For Bill is a jealous CEO and will abide no other OS before him. And his
minions shall smite all others from the land of heads, cylinders, and
sectors as they shall find them. And the mouths of the elders shall be
bound so no one shall be able to cry out "Foul Monopoly" in the land of
marketing, though the bankrupted widows and orphans of the slain shall
have no relief. But behold! The High shall be made Low. From out of the
Light, mighty Deamons and Penguins appear. They come to pour scented
balms upon the wounds of the afflicted. And to bind these wounds whilst
asking naught in return but admonish, "Go ye likewise and do unto
others."
- Amen -
Once you get all your OSes sorted out, go get xosl (the free eXtended Op
System Loader) and use it to boot all the systems you have. See:
http://www.xosl.org
It's a lot cooler and slicker interface than the loaders for FreeBSD and
Linux. And it keeps that legacy Redmond system in check as well.
--
Chas2K
======== * ===== www.unixstar.com =============
- Support a free and democratic Taiwan -
===============================================
------------------------------
** FOR YOUR REFERENCE **
The service address, to which questions about the list itself and requests
to be added to or deleted from it should be directed, is:
Internet: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
You can send mail to the entire list (and comp.os.linux.advocacy) via:
Internet: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Linux may be obtained via one of these FTP sites:
ftp.funet.fi pub/Linux
tsx-11.mit.edu pub/linux
sunsite.unc.edu pub/Linux
End of Linux-Advocacy Digest
******************************
