UBUNTU SUCKS!!

[mac_shinobi]

I disagree. There is going to be a place for Windows for a long time yet, and even then the OS market is going to be unrecognisable in any case.

 

A lot of work places have got windows and I don't think that will change for a long time - I use windows at work which I freaking hate but I cant change that - freaking bill gates !!!

[polaris]

All true....but ultimately!

 

Its the smart young ladies and gentlemen in today's schools that will decide what and how "computers" are used....Windows on Linux, Linux on Windows?

 

It will be the processing power that makes it all happen.

 

And my money on the world in 10 years time will be.....opensource; and maybe not as we know it today. Something somewhere just now emerging is likely to be the winner, not what we have today.

 

I remember when IBM were so dominant that MS pales into insignificance by comparison...they made one wrong move and poof, ask any teenager if they have heard of IBM - they proved to me that it all moves so fast in computing you just cannot recapture what you lost.

 

Ten bob with anyone! (Thats 50p to most of you).

 

CB

[srochford]

It makes you wonder how we ever coped back in the day? Back in the early 90's when I first got on the Internet I had to install a TCP/IP stack by hand, edit alot more config file than 'one line in xorg.conf', set up some dial up scripts, hard code a static IP and pray the thing would work. When it did I had a Terminal only session to the internet. There was Gopher but no pretty graphic WWW.

 

Eeee, you were lucky. When I were a lad ...

 

Ooops! Wrong thread :-)

[tmcd35]

Eeee, you were lucky. When I were a lad ...

 

God damn it! Am I really getting that old?

[srochford]

Hi,

 

A little bit of history - bear with me......cutting quite a bit of history out here but you will get the point!

 

 

So, soon the argument is going to be pointless, the world is going to have a UNIX base, Linux/Windows you choose but underneath its UNIX.

 

CB

 

I think you've missed out great chunks of history that were important (eg what about CP/M) Dave Cutler worked on VAX/VMS and left that to lead the Windows NT team; XP obviously developed from that via Windows 2000 and Cutler is still at MS working on the next generation of software. I don't think it's true to say that Windows is in anyway based on Unix. Yes, there are some ideas which are similar but I really don't think you can go much further than that.

[tmcd35]

And my money on the world in 10 years time will be.....opensource; and maybe not as we know it today. Something somewhere just now emerging is likely to be the winner, not what we have today.

 

Ten bob with anyone! (Thats 50p to most of you).

 

CB

 

I'll bite. Half a crown that Windows survives the next decade!

 

A lots got to happen for Windows to disappear. OpenOffice is making very strong in-roads. OS X is catching the publics imagination. And both KDE and Gnome are bring *nix to a point were it is a serious alternative on the Desktop.

 

But M$ have two very important markets sown up. The cooperate and the hard-core gamer. Linux and VMWare are starting to push M$ in the server room but not on the desktop. And M$ is fighting back hard with Hyper-V and unlimited VM's in Windows Datacenter.

 

If M$ or Sony can convince the hard core gamer to leave the PC and move to console land, if Apple can continue to convert the light home PC user (the word and internet only crowd), if OpenOffice can continue to improve M$ Office compatibility or Cloud computing can provide a viable web based alternative, then possibly Windows may become a fading memory.

[powdarrmonkey]

I hope to $(deity) it's not KDE4... 4.1, perhaps, just not 4. *begs*

[powdarrmonkey]

Heh... "I really like its flicky action"

[tmcd35]

It's all well and good showing mr and mrs average KDE4 and letting them believe its Win7. But when they get it home and can't install there printer, broadband or favourite game - the OP's mouse problem starts to pale into insignificance.

[polaris]

I think you've missed out great chunks of history that were important (eg what about CP/M) Dave Cutler worked on VAX/VMS and left that to lead the Windows NT team; XP obviously developed from that via Windows 2000 and Cutler is still at MS working on the next generation of software. I don't think it's true to say that Windows is in anyway based on Unix. Yes, there are some ideas which are similar but I really don't think you can go much further than that.

 

Yes, I did say that I had left out whole chunks of history (how long have you got?)......And no my basis of argument about Windows and Unix is that the core of NT is VMS (MS paid over $100k compensation to Digital).... There is no accident that Dave called NT as he did - as he confessed a few years back.

 

(I worked at Digital at the time on the first 11/780).

 

Windows is just a GUI after all, the kernal is the important part and that is the point I am trying to make. The success of NT changed the face of MS, successfully and for the better and became the basis of (at last) a stable MS product.

 

VMS undoubtably came from a UNIX(like) stable and so the genes can be traced right back. Irrespective of the name of the OS; most OS originally came from a strong core of programmers in the US and I might add the UK.

 

There is no accident in the MS team also including former Bell Labs employees (or did).

 

It's a tenuous link I admit but its there one I like to throw in whenever I hear arguments about Linux and MS. At the end of the day is end user usability, peer pressure and marketing that got us where we are today.

 

Strange thing is that there is a version of Linux working on an original 1979 Vax 11/780 right now.

 

And if you ever get the chance to work on Embedded XP you will immediately see how the structure of XP is similar to Unix and the methodology of 'C'.

 

I can also tell you that MS did make a foray into Linux would you believe? Why not, the core is free and anyone can use it - it made commercial sense apart from one thing, marketing. They then tried to get Linux blocked by throwing money at SCO - who claimed ownership of key parts (and still do).

 

Now the question is where are we going? It might finally be the credit crunch that starts the opensource wheel rolling properly.

 

And watch IBM.....there is life in the old blue yet! They have some old scores to settle......oh, and a big wallet and a relationship with Sun.

 

IBM - Collaboration solutions - United States

 

(No I don't work for IBM).

 

CB

[jamesb]

Now the question is where are we going? It might finally be the credit crunch that starts the opensource wheel rolling properly.

 

Unfortunately I can also see the credit crunch killing the opensource community. Less investment in new ideas, less money for the hobbyist developer community, and possibly even a lot less free time for people to develop in.

 

Hopefully this won't be the case, but I can certainly see it as a possibility.

[localzuk]

Unfortunately I can also see the credit crunch killing the opensource community. Less investment in new ideas, less money for the hobbyist developer community, and possibly even a lot less free time for people to develop in.

 

Hopefully this won't be the case, but I can certainly see it as a possibility.

 

I'd have thought the opposite were true. Whilst people are unemployed, they will be exercising their brains by spending more time doing OSS work. Whilst looking for a paid job at the same time.

[polaris]

Yup, you are absolutely correct, could go either way.

 

With the prices that MS are offering now its almost Opensource anyhow!

 

The history of computers is a fascinating mix of brilliance technically and brilliance in marketing.

 

Don't get me wrong I am not a MS basher, I like the products. I used to hate Bill, but that was born from jealousy not from any rational thought.

 

And I really like what he is doing with his money now.....wish I could.

 

Let's put it this way, if a plane was crashing and I had one spare parachute and it was a toss up between Bill and a Bank Director!

 

CB

[tmcd35]

Let's put it this way, if a plane was crashing and I had one spare parachute and it was a toss up between Bill and a Bank Director!

 

CB

 

I'd take the parachute for myself and and let them both kiss their

 

[gshaw]

All true....but ultimately!

 

Its the smart young ladies and gentlemen in today's schools that will decide what and how "computers" are used....Windows on Linux, Linux on Windows?

 

If that's true I give you... Facebook OS

 

Whichever way it goes I hope the future isn't

 

a) Ran by Google

b) Cloud Computing

 

Very suspicious of both... bad enough when software "phones home" never mind when it's being run by the provider and you have no control over it - power to the desktop

 

As for Linux I've tried to like it... tried different distros and different hardware but always get aggro very early on for simple things that I personally expect as a given on a modern day OS. Tried Ubuntu, installed OK, very pretty setup... logged in... then it logged straight back out again with no word of explanation, very odd. Same for some weird wireless issues on my eeePC, ended up formatting with WinFLP which was a shame but end of the day needed to browse Internet on it, not mess around with wireless configs.

 

Tried Linux Mint as well as the website blurb makes it look very flash... again issues with graphics drivers so I couldn't get a working desktop...

 

The Linux-based IPCop appliances we use work nicely for what they do and quick to setup but driver support causes problems at times... right pain but on balance it's free which always helps!

 

Personally for the mainstream I'll stick with desktop PCs \ Windows for a while yet - Windows 7 will be the make or break for MS desktop OS I think

[tmcd35]

I've said this before elsewhere, and will say it again here. I'd like to see a good bare metal hypervisor on the desktop. I'd also like to see better support for graphics hardware virtualisation.

 

What we want is to remove the complication of different chipset, graphics, sound, etc hardware with losing the performance.

 

This will take away the complication of drivers and give Linux/OS-X/Windows/etc a level playing field.

 

The closest we have at the moment is ESXi which is very picky on which hardware it will install on and doesn't support graphics acceleration/virtualisation.