well, I never claimed that the windows should completely be redesigned. mind u that the GUI is well designed and many people like it that way. In any case the problem I think Microsoft have, is that they are repeating their mistakes over and over. moreover, the problem is not that their product sucks from a security standpoint, the problem is that they claimed its secure to the consumers when in fact its a misleading claim. Another thing, I did not say that an open source or Linux in particular would be better. although I have my preferences, that is not the issue. the issue is that Microsoft has betrayed the trust the public gave it, in that they used a bad design "INTENTIONALLY" in order to monopolize their hold on the middleware market. So, in retrospect, they did knowingly put "bugs" in the system, because a bad design which was done intentionally implies future bugs. If I would have to say what they did wrong, Its that they claimed their system do 1,2,3 and in fact it is doing 0.1,0.2,0.3 ;) (and of course, please sign your blood signature here here and... here. "what does 'no liablility means?" "oh nothing.. just that we can do what ever the hell we like") Free or not, you sell me something, I expect to hold u to your words. When I can't, the public want to be compensated for the ordeal. Think of it this way, if Microsoft supplied all the water in the world, and one day they said: "I will not sell u water if u don't drink from winCupNT with the IESuperDuperHandle" that would cause in most cultures an outrage. And so to prevent chaos, the market have rules so that no one will have ultimate control over something. (which reminds me the deadlock/starvation problems).
* - * - * Tzahi Fadida [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fax (+1 Outside the US) 240-597-3213 * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * > -----Original Message----- > From: Shlomi Fish [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] > Sent: Wednesday, March 06, 2002 6:26 PM > To: Tzahi Fadida > Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: RE: No more windows ?? > > > > Note: Terribly long lines. Please tweak your mailer to cut them. > > On Wed, 6 Mar 2002, Tzahi Fadida wrote: > > > I don't know how this topic became economics 101, but I want to > return to the quote. > > If you'll open any operating system concepts book, you will see > that separating the shell or the user interface, is very > important in order for the os to have a good design. Microsoft > has put its monopolistic interests over the design and quality of > the product. If there was an ethic committee for these kind of > violations they would be disbarred, but because there is not, The > public interest is to make Microsoft pay for their mistakes. And > as you know, people like to see blood. > > Microsoft has earned enough of consumer money to make a good > product, and if they need to pull it off the shelves to fix it, > than so be it. > > Mind you, the browser is not the only issue, which if I would > have to list their indiscretions it would exceed the netiques of > this list. I want to point out one of these other issues - > security. bill gates openly admitted his organization lack of > understanding or compliance with security. Now it is undeniably > that Microsoft knew from the beginning that they are putting a > product which is insecure on the shelves. I think, this is a more > important issue that costs billions each year in security damages > by viruses and holes. > > Not only the damages in monetary quantification, but also > insurance policies which have higher premiums as a result, > causing less businesses to insure themselves. > > All in all, I think Microsoft acted irresponsibly. > > Perhaps they did. But the public should have known not to trust what > Microsoft gave it and use Linux or FreeBSD or whatever, instead. > > Convincing the public that NT is good is not a crime. The Microsoft > Programmers did not introduce the bugs on purpose. MS is notorious for the > bad code its programmers produce, but they also have rigorous testing > periods, a zero-bug policy (which I'm not sure is extrapolated to their > release times, but still it exists), and making sure the product is not > re-written from scratch. (which can possibly introduce the old bugs all > over again). Naturally, they are not measures that are enough when > releasing a piece of software that is responsible for handling requests > from an open Internet. > > If people wish to get MS a chance to make their products more secure, it's > up to them. Or they can switch to OpenBSD or Linux or whatever else has a > better record. MS does not _force_ anyone to buy its products. If I don't > want to use NT/IIS/Exchange at all, I can if I want to. > > I believe even many open-source developers act irresponsibly. I even > have problems with some of Linus Torvalds' decisions. Open-Source is not a > a panacea for security. And some commercial products have better records > than many open-source ones. > > I don't think the government should restrict commercial software, because > the natural implication would be that free software will have to be > restricted to. I mentioned it on Hackers-IL, that Freecell Solver does not > check for malloc() returning NULL and so may cause the process to segfault > if you ran out of memory. That will make implementing a kick-ass > multi-threaded Freecell solving server a bit difficult. > > Now, I do not prohibit people from using Freecell Solver that way. And I > have better things to do with the code that the average user will find > more desirable, than a process that does not segfault if his computer ran > out of memory. Or just relax doing other things beside hacking on it. > > By giving power to the censor, the public or any interesant portion of it > eventually gives it power to demise itself. What's the alternative? A free > competition environment. In it people can mislead for a very short time if > any, regardless of how much money, PR, or FUD the entity spreads. And > naturally, every person is responsible for himself. > > Regards, > > Shlomi Fish > > > > > * - * - * > > Tzahi Fadida > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > Fax (+1 Outside the US) 240-597-3213 > > * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * > > > > > > ================================To unsubscribe, send mail to > [EMAIL PROTECTED] with > > the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command > > echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > Shlomi Fish [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Home Page: http://t2.technion.ac.il/~shlomif/ > Home E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > "Let's suppose you have a table with 2^n cups..." > "Wait a second - is n a natural number?" ================================================================To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
