Hey who really cares what MS does?

When you try and get support for a piece of Windows' OEM firmware that's gone wrong, you'll bounce between the vendor, the support desk teenager, the dead-linked MS support sites and the (even worse) driver makers' helpful links to unhelpful and expensive customer support numbers. Trust me. ;-(

It's designed to make the end user give in and live without whatever they paid good money for.

In the end, this kind of (24-7!) support is too expensive for companies to provide. This community and the other linux communities deal in a different currency.

Personally, I like to think of the computer 'system' as being not just the box and software, it's what you get with it (or don't get) too.

Bill doesn't do these kind of systems, so maybe that's why he's upset that his .NET initiative and propietary meta-compilers won't be enough.

MS bought the origianl version of DOS, but all development since then was off their own backs. Xerox designed and implemented the first windows GUI which they showed Apple how to do after their own management could not see the value in it. Since then both MS and Apple have done a lot of work on the interface. Who knows if the court case had gone slightly differently you'd all be sitting here bad mouthing Apple and championing MS.

MS have done a huge amount of work and research in the personal computing field, probably more than most.

Although I will probably get flamed for this MS does make fairly good products, which are easy for novice users to cope with, and if it wasn't for MS Apple wouldn't be here anymore. MS are probably never going to go away, they fought hard to get to where they are, and they are not going to give it up easily.

Linux will probably never win the desktop war, in truth I think it should stop trying to and focus on what it excells at, being a development platform. Linux maybe more flexible than Windows but its always trying to copy Windows functions and features.

Also most of the agro aimed at MS is misplaced, the real enemys of Linux are the zelots and the propritary Unix companies. Zelots who abuse anybody that uses Windows and companies that do not release products/drivers for Linux are not doing the comunity any good. The Unix manufacturers, IBM, Sun and AT&T(Bell Labs), have software that could easily be ported over to the Linux platform, which would give the platform much more specialist software and open Linux to a greater number of users. But they are not going to do this either.

The one thing that is true, you did hit on the head. Windows is the king of the desktop.
Big Deal.
They produce a product that focuses on one thing: User Friendliness.
Not security.
Not stability.
Not capability, performance, functionality, pricing, or correctness.
So you can have your easy-to-use operating system, on your desktop. Too bad you're missing out on everything that an operating system should have primarily and in the first place...

Imagine if the entire world adopted that mentality... how would you like to fly in a plane, knowing that all of the guages, controls, sticks, knobs, buttons, screens, pedals, and training that went into keeping the plane functional were to difficult? Now the plane has 3 controls and one screen, so it's really user friendly. and when it crashes, just reboot it, you'll be OK because it's "easy to operate."

MS isn't scared of Linux at all. Yes, Linux is a larger player now in the server side of large scale business (mine included) but the home user and office users will always been running a MS powered OS. Why, because it's easy. Time is money and most business don't have the time to teach their employees Linux just to switch.

hm? how in the world did they get hold of that memo?
strange to find something like this floating around the internet? would MS admit to something like this in such a desperate manner in public? doesn't seem like sound business practices...

in any case, i agree with finegan... the uptime, stability and security of linux far surpasses whatever i've seen on windows (to be honest, i've not seen all of it ie. haven't really tried their server side stuff nor the recent XP)

i'm not sure about the integrity of Bill as a businessman... heck i'm ever suspicious of businessmen anyway... u can't win that much if u're not that wily. but to say he is a competent businessman, i have to agree.

all that said and done, if i could see what Bill or Dell (or other business greats) see, i would probably have done the same as them given the same situation. i don't think judging a product has got to do with judging a businessman (there's probably more correlation with the business practice than the person himself)

anyway, just my 2 cents...

I don't disagree with you on the whole, I do use windows every day, mainly to play games (dos games rule!), but also for word processing and such like. However, Linux is not just about stopping ppl use windows at all. Its about freedom of choice, and if ppl like using windows then let them, nobody is forcing anyone to use anything....except microsoft.

My gripe is with the company itself, their policies and standards which deny freedom. One small example is creating their own mp3 like files under windows media player. Except that it isn't standard with the rest. What about compatbility issues with old versions of MS word? How one company can dictate what you will be using, and literally force it is something from the past.

One thing which does annoy me is the attacks by Micro$oft on Open Source, calling Linux a cancer and illegal. Also their support of the DMCA, and funding for other such bills can only confirm that they are scared of Linux, and want it out of their way.

i agree, if i was some big company and had this OS that 90% of the world had on their computer, then some little guy with an army of thousands developed a OS better than mine or equivalent and was giving it away for free, i would be scared, very scared, cause if i worked so long at something and was selling it, then something came along and was real competition, the only real way for me to compete with the new guy would to give my OS away for free too.. hence. isn't that what happened to the IE and Netscape thing... Microsoft just gave it away for free so they can get Netscape out of the pic, thus enforcing Netscape to stop selling but give theirs away to try and keep up... hmm..

M$ is running scared because they know that Linux will eventually dominate. As it becomes easier to use, and more and more software is created and ported to it, MicroSoft will have a hard time competing against such a cheap and powerful operating system.

On top of that, Linux is simply mor secure than Windows can ever get, and in this day and age, when companies are preaching security and protection to people, and broadband becomes more common place, people will want that security and privacy.

As for home users that will never happen. By the time Linux (RH v33.7) becomes easy enough for the mainstream user to master, Windows will have found a way to be as powerful if not more powerful than Linux and maintain it's ease of use. I'm not knocking Linux, I like it alot, but you can't honestly say that. It just won't happen.

Maybe I am being hopeful, but from what I see, my generation and the ones after me are very computer savy, and and like choice and freedom. The older generations are not so apt to change because they have only really used one thing, and they have no real desire to switch from what they know.

I think as the generations go on, and more and more people see what M$ is doing and how they take away our freedom of choice and and block everything behind cloud of proprietary crap, Linux will prevail. It will take time, and a lot of hard work, and alot failures, but it iwll happen. Remember, M$ needs money to survive, Linux does not.

As for your ease of use comment... KDE is making great strides, and now I find it almost as easy to use as Windows. It could stand a few improvements, but so can the Windows desktop.

you're not going to see one of the mainstream distros we have right now bring linux onto the desktop. It's going to take a company like AOL that can focus on the whole ease-of-use-for-our-stupid-customers stance and port a kernel over into thier own product. I wouldn't be surprised to see a company take the most basic functionality of Linux and apply it to something basic, like an Internet surfing machine; no administration needed, just a fully functional precompiled and installed version of AOL built around Linux, with no user interaction needed (or even available. It boots you to KDE, which is pretty like the Windows GUI, and you have a browser open up and connect to AOL.com. It could be that simple.

Quote:

Remember, M$ needs money to survive, Linux does not.

um... i believe linux in fact needs funding(perhaps just not as massive as MS), whether it is fuelled by commercial(eg rh and md) or a more community/donor style (eg deb or slack)...
even the more community minded distros like debian and slackware ask for donations or sell mugs, t-shirts etc

even your beloved KDE requires funding... development and testing is usually not a cheap task...

just some clarification...

of course, feel free to correct me if i am wrong... this is what i understand, that's all...

I suppose for people that only use internet, a computer that boots up with such limitations would be fine. However, while the older people may only run internet, younger people are using their computers for running multimedia, games, office suites, etc. so that kind of computer will not help Linux sales.

There are several things that I believe will help Linux sales, but the biggest is getting it out there for home users to see. Alot of ads on TV and radio, just like M$ does, and focus on the home market. Linux is not well known from a home user perspective. If companies got it known, then the next time MicroSoft put out another O/S, (which should be in another year), they will either not update, or look at alternatives. It does not need to work so hard on the server market, because it is well known by most IT people, and M$ does not have the market share in that area anyway.

In the end though, lets face it.... only Linux stands a chance of making M$ run. Nothing else realy has their attention, nor ever had their attention to any great degree. Obviously the community is doing something right.

Mac OS X has done a great job of creating a easy to use GUI with a strong OS and terminal underneath

well, that's cos it's *nix underneath it all. and as for the gui, i don't like it at all... my friend has it on his laptop, and that stupid menu bar at the bottom that grows when your mouse goes over each icon.. ughhh

the internet box idea is quite nice i think. Our new digital cable tv box has internet on it. yeah arse it does.... it annoys me that so many people who've heard about the internet see that a copy of the internet is inside their tv now, and want a go... they get one sad, lonely site to look at, and give people totally the wrong idea of what the net is. an inexpensive off the shelf box is a pretty good idea, as long as you can actually USE the internet properly, or rather use the web properly.