Actually on some level these days PCs not only operate without what we technically refer to as an OpSys via Firmware (especially Intel) that remains active even when we think our PCs are "Off" but have access to anything installed as well as WiFi and can "phone home" on unsecured networks. This is only exacerbated by Windows which can even circumvent encrypted file systems it "supports". Shades of the old Wintel Monopoly eh? If you think this is paranoid fantasy lookup Intel MCH or better, check this out

(Warning: Boring Computer Nerd Content but also HUGE Important reveal)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcwngbUrZNg

Then check out the Win10 EULA. If you buy the wolf in sheep's clothing "new" Microsoft, the same one that not that long ago referred to Linux as "That Virus!" you may "not be paranoid enough" (to borrow concepts and statements from Balmer and Gates own mouths).

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Back in the old days of mainframes, most OS's were rented. Before UNIX, OS's were written in machine code so they were machine-specific. The OS came from the manufacturer, who updated it as and when required. It's funny that MS is going back to this archaic model.

2 members found this post helpful.

There are a ton of e-mail clients for linux. If you didn't find one that was similar to Em in ease of use and attributes, you didn't look very hard at all for one.

I bet the "Vehicle Manager" I use on my Slackware system is far less space-wasting than yours, is as easy to use and does the necessary things...and I've been using it since around 2009 IIRR. It's called VMT. It runs on *any* OS, supposedly. Find it here http://vmt.sourceforge.net/

It literally looks like you simply did not try very hard at all to find equivalents to the Windows programs you like, at least that's the way it seems to read *to me*.

Right here you say Windows is simple and for simpletons anymore, and yet you then go on to say you keep your system the same as your clients'...presumably to fix.

I'm a regular Joe. No IT guru, no programmer in any way. I literally used Windows from 3.1 to 98SE and in the year 2000 couldn't stand the crapware of that OS a second longer and, stuck on a dial-up, I started downloading different Linux distro's (it usually would take 2 full days to complete a download) to try out, *anything* to stop being stuck on Windows and it screwing all my work/games/hardware up (it didn't take many brownouts on a FAT32 HDD for it to become a boat anchor, compared to HDD's I've still got that I formatted with Reiser and living out in the woods, in a county that had piss-poor lines already and all it took was a bird to fart while lit on a pole to knock it over, and in an area that is commonly hit with tornados and severe storms all year long...none of my HDD's have gone bad yet.

In the meantime, I was the one that *everyone* called to come fix their computers, and that included that abortion known as W2000 also. I *still* get people asking me all the time to come over and fix their brand new machines and I tell them I don't mess with Windows anymore for no amount of money because it got to the point I'd be hollering and cussing at the machine within 15 minutes and luckily never had a nice 32 oz framing hammer nearby any of the times.

The pathetic 'updates/upgrades' one is damn near *forced* to suffer through or be told your system *will* become a statistic one way or another - by Microsoft(!) are enough to make one suffer with PTSD the rest of ones days. The horror stories of those things screwing up peoples' computers is enough to say Windows is *NOT* "almost idiot proof". Also, the simple thing of one having to reboot their system after having installed a piece of software, no matter how small, is absolutely *NOT* "idiot proof", but *built *by* idiots*.

If anything is "idiot proof", it's one of the 'buntu distros, unfortunately. The reason I say 'unfortunately' is because it will draw into the Linux Land more and more of the 'idiots' of Windows Land, and eventually Ubuntu forums will look like old Windows forums from back in '98 all except for actual 'problems' with software or hardware. It'll be filled with people wanting to know how to install a new kernel or such things or how they missed a keystroke installing a new kernel and it screwed something up and they didn't backup *before* doing it and now all their stuff is gone, or other such things. The rest of the noise will be 'I wanna be a programmer. How do I go about doing it?' type of garbage, then the programming world will become flooded with idiots who can barely walk and chew bubblegum simultaneously, which will eventually start to affect *all* Linux distros.

24 hours in a day is the same now, as it was 10 years ago. A person new to computers at all *does* have to 'learn' how to use it, and if they have any intelligence they're curious enough to *want* to get under the hood...even a little bit, so saying that like it's a bad thing is simply wrong. If they live here where I am, out in the woods 45+ miles from *possibly* there being a shop one can take their computer to, doesn't make things any easier for the poor Windows user whose system *has* screwed up on them, and believe me, there's an awful lot of areas in this country that are still wide open or woods where people are far from 'civilization' and that kind of help in general.

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that anything you spoke of in that paragraph about Linux/Slackware is something that *must* be done. Besides, just because Windows doesn't let you know that things like that *CAN* be done, doesn't mean "it's not in Windows". Microsoft just doesn't want the everyday Joe to know much about it. They want compliant idots who will keep spending that dough on a new version of Windows, or a new version of MS Office that doesn't work with any *other* version of MS Office, ad nauseam.

If it's not a 'problem', there wouldn't be a "proviso". It *does* still happen, you can't deny it. Linux users *do* leave their systems running 24/7 (at least *I* do, always have, always will, except of course if a blackout occurs and I think it'll outlast my UPS batteries, heh). Again too, you contradict yourself about how Windows isn't a 'problem' like it used to always be, when you say you wait 5 months for any new version of it to 'mature'.

No, "in all fairness" it wasn't hardware. It was an OS made by 'tards. It was an OS run by an unethical owner. Funny how Linux ran fine on the same hardware. You're trying too hard to blame any problems Windows had and still has on anything *but* Windows and those who make/design/write it. If you can't leave a Windows server running 24/7, it's garbage, plain and simple.

Again, I'm just a plain ol' GUI-using biker who couldn't write a bash script to save my life, and I *DO* have a laptop that's older than dirt (a HP 6735b which came out in 2008 if I remember right, with a AMD Turion x2...ugh) with W7 on it that I use literally *strictly* for two old W98 games I still have and like to play once or twice a year (Diablo and Warcraft 2 (3?)), and even then it runs like crap, but it's native, sort of, for those games and the machine cost me $45, has no battery (nor do I want one) and is *NEVER* online. It's more a nostalgia type of thing, I really, really like(d) both those games and never really got around to finishing either of them, so I still am going at it albeit far slower than I was back in W95 and W98(SE) days. When I *am* on that machine playing one of those games, I'm constantly finding myself tense, waiting for it to screw up and lose my place, so, it's not exactly as *fun* as I wish it would be, but hey, it was cheap and can be a good backup when needed (like as in another thread I started where I lost internet on my Slackware system...I have the awful feeling it was something *I* did, not something that went wrong with the Slackware, because we never did find the actual culprit as to why or how it happened, and, knowing me and my piss-poor memory, I could have clicked something I was messing with for whatever reason and simply forgot I'd done it.).

Anyway, as an ex-Windows user of several years and a few of the versions, and someone who is *constantly* telling my friends to 're-install' (because as far as I'm concerned, if it (Windows) messed up on them, I'm not going to put myself through the hell of trying to fix it if they can't be bothered to try on their own) when they call me saying their Windows screwed up on them one way or another. Give me my Linux and I'm a happy camper!

Man, what a thread and this post turned out to be a long one! Hah!

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Just wanted to mention that Windows 2000 wasn't really that bad... but Windows ME was horrible (I'm thinking you meant Windows ME in your statement, but that's just a guess). I liked Windows 2000 a lot more than Windows 98 and I still preferred it over the first year or two of Windows XP (until they finally got that to be decent). Windows 2000 was really only used in business environments or for those users who used "alternative methods" to install it on their home computers.

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Why I use Slackware:

* Because I understand it
* Because it's stable and predictable
* Because it doesn't disappoint me inevitably, like all other distros I've tried
* Because it was introduced on my birthday (July 17)
* Because the developer(s) is/are accessible and participates in this forum
* Because it doesn't use systemd
* Because editing text files is easy
* Because I don't need a network connection to install a fully-operational system
* Because it has a cool name
* Because... hey you damn kids, get off of my lawn!

6 members found this post helpful.

I agree on all points! Also, Slackware generally supports the hardware on all of my laptops/desktops. I've recently stopped running the BSDs due to spotty hardware support on many of my units. I'm not likely to brick my units when I apply a Slackware security update *cough M$ cough *

2 members found this post helpful.

That's cool. Thanks for posting it.
The way I read it, he has no time, reason or inclination to try and look for alternatives. What he has works well enough for him. For people like that, I think its fair that they stay wherever they're comfortable.
In my opinion, W2K was one of the best Windows versions ever. Being based on NT meant that it was far better than 95/98/Me, which were basically just DOS stretched beyond it's limits.

Side note: Windows NT was basically Digital VMS re-written for x86: https://www.itprotoday.com/compute-e...vms-rest-story
You know these games will most likely run better in an emulator on Linux. If you can't be bothered messing with Wine, etc., there is Playonlinux.

The pain.

I do it for the pain.

"You know how they say you only hurt the ones you love? Well, it works both ways." -- Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club.

Windows 2000 was and is the best/simplest/most coherent OS ever launched by MS

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A great OS, especially with all service packs and updates installed. Having said that, W2K used to give me a lot of grief with a corrupted filesystem, and also with a boot sector needing to be repaired, especially first thing Monday mornings, for some reason. I had a theory at the time it had something to do with the cold and damp over the weekend, when these businesses were closed. Or the heads on those notorious Maxtor and Deskstar disks sticking.

I never saw fight club but your post made me think of this music video:
Juliet - Ride The Pain

Great point. Operating systems are complex, but Slackware is, within this level of complexity, quite manageable and understandable.

Thanks Pat for designing such a great, simple, resilient system.

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Addiction. Asked my doctor. Said it is unrecoverable. I don't know what will I do Slackware cease to exist?

1 members found this post helpful.

Worry not my dear friend!

It can't cease to exist, but it might merely stop to update eventually

This thread has some beautiful rants. Here's mine, though I won't attest to its beauty, I will attest that it is a rant:

I used to make the most stunning web-sites with macromedia dreamweaver, fireworks, and flash. Then adobe bought macromedia, and those tools were abandoned. Reading all those instructions to work those abandoned tools turned out to be a waste of time, except for the one valuable lesson I learned from it: for-profit corporations are unpredictable and don't care about me--"the golden rule" is something entirely different when applied to corporations, vs individuals.

Ever since, I have selected stable tools that don't have strong corporate allegiances and that have stood the test of time, thereby mitigating risk that I'm reading documentation in vain:

• for programming, after years of language hopping, I settled on lisp, because it did not create a new syntax, but just borrowed from existing math (lamda calculus), and as for the test of time: it's been around since 1958!
• for editing lisp code, I like emacs, as it was written in lisp in 1976, so has stood the test of time too, and over 40 years of contributed macros make it, imho, the people's ai engine!
• and for an operating system, since 1993, Slackware has stood the test of time more than any active linux distro, and it has never updated itself or changed itself without my permission!

Reading Slackware documentation is productive, and I don't have to work under the shadow of how long is this documentation going to be good for, before it is changed or bought out by a bigger company. Learning about Slackware has been far more worth it than reading those macromedia instruction manuals for dreamweaver, fireworks, and flash ever was.

I still have my licensed copies of those macromedia tools; but they only work on powerpc architecture: another example of how a corporate product can just ditch it's user base -- when apple ditched powerpc for x86, I think their philosophy was, if you can afford an apple, then you can afford another apple; I don't think they've changed.

Switching and using linux became more than just sound business decisions: corporate operating systems and the software that runs on them ticked me off enough to lose my loyalty forever. From many of the rants in this thread, I've gleaned I'm not alone with this sentiment. If a game doesn't run on linux, then I don't play it. That game isn't worth supporting the predatory nature of the beast.

The game now of course is trying to find open hardware on which to run Slackware and its deblobbed cousin, Freenix. For me running Slackware is a message: I bought my computer: I own it, and I want it to listen to its owner, and not serve another master, the way SCerovec put it. But no matter how open-source linux is, if spyware lurks in the firmware of the chips on the motherboard, then, we need new motherboards with opensource firmware. I tried to get a pine64, but they're all stuck in china: ironically the cororna virus slows down computers.

I use Slackware, not just because "it just works," but also because it feels better! It feels better not supporting predator products in anyway. Tune in. Drop out. Stop feeding the beast. Slackware is the "feel good" os. Being good feels good. Feed Pat though: send him your dough. Another thread confirmed that his patreon is legit. I think, having been founded and maintained by P.V., an individual, a person, like you or me, makes Slackware seem the least corporate of all the distros, and this was an enormous factor (besides the sound working on the powerpc clamshell) in settling on Slackware as the final hop.


P.S. Here's how Slackware will make me feel better today: I'm going to make the pulseaudio sound system on local Slackware connect to remote Slackware and record a vocal reminder message that remote Slackware is going to send via asterisk voip server by telephone call to Capital One, reminding them that I will never accept any credit offers, so they should quit wasting environmental resources getting offers of credit lines to my physical mailbox--grr. I've never made this slackware asterisk box call individuals with past-due reminders or the like -- but I'm not opposed to giving the corporate world a taste of its own medicine--how else will they learn the ethical golden rule? Don't like getting recorded phone reminders? Then stop sending them out. I am using Slackware to help reduce environmental waste by phone spamming Corporations into not sending me physical junk mail. Slackware is helping me deliver justice, which makes me feel better. Thus, Slackware makes me feel better.

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