thunder wrote:
On Wed, 04 Oct 2006 08:31:03 -0400, Bert Robbins wrote:

Short Wave Sportfishing wrote:
On Wed, 04 Oct 2006 12:11:59 -0000, "thunder"
wrote:

Hey, I'm a Linux advocate. When I switched, I never looked back.
Ok, I'll take you up on that.

But first, explain what it's advantages and disadvantages are.
No viruses.

I believe there is one. ;-)

Terse documentation.

Not really. I'll admit some program's documentation is lacking, but much
documentation is quite detailed, and with the net, you can generally find
any answer.

Complicated interfaces.

What interface? There are so many choices.


If something goes wrong you fix it, or ask on the net if you can still
get to it.

Linux is a great environment if your application or needs fit. But, it
is not a general purpose environment for those that want to use a
computer to surf, play video, audio and other general activities.

Seriously, I'm not sure that holds true anymore. Over 8,000 apps, surely
you can find a fit. Oh, as for video and audio, Bill's Digital Rights
Management is getting down right intrusive, IMO.

I first started using Linux back when the kernel was 0.?? and the
distribution was on 3.5 inch diskettes. My first installation was on a
386/25 with a 40MB HD and 4MB of RAM. A kernel build took about 24 hours
and was the only thing running on the system. This was back in 1990/1/2

I PPP'd into work and to my ISP.

I have come to the conclusion that I like doing higher level work and
that is what I do. I would rather spend my non-working, non-honey-do and
non-sleeping time in activities that I enjoy, boating, fishing, golfing
and ****ing off several people in this news group.

I don't buy too many M$ appliations because I don't need many. My kids
like to run games on M$ so M$ OSes make sense at home.

thunder wrote:
On Wed, 04 Oct 2006 15:41:54 +0000, Short Wave Sportfishing wrote:

You know what all this reminds me of?

The bad old days of CPM. :)

Slightly before my time, but IIRC, you one time mentioned that you loved
DOS. That you "could make it sing", IIRC. One of the things I like about
Linux, it has a GUI, yes, but it also integrates a command line. I find I
still use the command line quite often, a through back to my DOS days, no
doubt.

Cygwin.

On Wed, 04 Oct 2006 18:46:21 -0400, Bert Robbins wrote:


I don't buy too many M$ appliations because I don't need many. My kids
like to run games on M$ so M$ OSes make sense at home.

Games, now that is definitely a disadvantage for Linux. I should have
mentioned that to Tom, but as I don't game, it slipped my mind. I'm a
Linux advocate, but I'm not a Linux fanatic. There's a reason Windows
still has a monopoly on the desktop, it's easy. I was just making the
point that if you are frustrated with MS BS, there are serviceable
alternatives.

"Bert Robbins" wrote in message
. ..
thunder wrote:
On Wed, 04 Oct 2006 08:31:03 -0400, Bert Robbins wrote:

Short Wave Sportfishing wrote:
On Wed, 04 Oct 2006 12:11:59 -0000, "thunder"
wrote:

Hey, I'm a Linux advocate. When I switched, I never looked back.
Ok, I'll take you up on that.

But first, explain what it's advantages and disadvantages are.
No viruses.

I believe there is one. ;-)

Terse documentation.

Not really. I'll admit some program's documentation is lacking, but much
documentation is quite detailed, and with the net, you can generally find
any answer.

Complicated interfaces.

What interface? There are so many choices.
If something goes wrong you fix it, or ask on the net if you can still
get to it.

Linux is a great environment if your application or needs fit. But, it
is not a general purpose environment for those that want to use a
computer to surf, play video, audio and other general activities.

Seriously, I'm not sure that holds true anymore. Over 8,000 apps, surely
you can find a fit. Oh, as for video and audio, Bill's Digital Rights
Management is getting down right intrusive, IMO.

I first started using Linux back when the kernel was 0.?? and the
distribution was on 3.5 inch diskettes. My first installation was on a
386/25 with a 40MB HD and 4MB of RAM. A kernel build took about 24 hours
and was the only thing running on the system. This was back in 1990/1/2

I PPP'd into work and to my ISP.

I have come to the conclusion that I like doing higher level work and that
is what I do. I would rather spend my non-working, non-honey-do and
non-sleeping time in activities that I enjoy, boating, fishing, golfing
and ****ing off several people in this news group.

I don't buy too many M$ appliations because I don't need many. My kids
like to run games on M$ so M$ OSes make sense at home.






Being an old UNIX guy, I designed disk subsystem for the DEC world, first
clone of a VAX SBI interface, and did Unix internals, I saw all the problems
with UNIX, and most of it is error handling. So much of UNIX and it's
variants is a senior thesis project, they just do not handle errors well.
Is hard to generate an error to test the error handling. As to virus's, if
it was the majority PC operating system, there would be as many viral
infestions as with MS. And the GUI interface was a rip off by Jobs and
Apple of the Xerox PARC interface. Xerox failed to patent a lot of items in
those days. Was why when Apple sued MS over the Windows I/F the judge
tossed the complaint. Told Apple, they did not invent it so why do they
think they can be the only ones with it.

On Thu, 05 Oct 2006 03:09:47 +0000, Calif Bill wrote:


As to virus's, if
it was the majority PC operating system, there would be as many viral
infestions as with MS.

As I haven't dealt with error handling, I can't comment, but the above
clearly isn't true. In the past, as "features", MS has opened so many
doors to virii you have to question their value of security. True, now,
they seem to be making an attempt, but geez, they still have a long way to
go.

Something else to consider, while *nix systems haven't made huge inroads
on to the desktop, in the server market, they both have a considerable
share, and, guess what, still no virii. Well, I'm told there is one.
Look, no OS is completely secure, but Linux takes security seriously, MS,
just recently, has seemed to. I'll wait and see how well.

"thunder" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 05 Oct 2006 03:09:47 +0000, Calif Bill wrote:


As to virus's, if
it was the majority PC operating system, there would be as many viral
infestions as with MS.

As I haven't dealt with error handling, I can't comment, but the above
clearly isn't true. In the past, as "features", MS has opened so many
doors to virii you have to question their value of security. True, now,
they seem to be making an attempt, but geez, they still have a long way to
go.

Something else to consider, while *nix systems haven't made huge inroads
on to the desktop, in the server market, they both have a considerable
share, and, guess what, still no virii. Well, I'm told there is one.
Look, no OS is completely secure, but Linux takes security seriously, MS,
just recently, has seemed to. I'll wait and see how well.

Most of the virus are similar to others. There are even virus generating
programs. Why you see so many virus with the same basic name, just
varients. There is not a lot of call for writing virus for *nix systems as
it is a low percentage. As to Severs, how many down load and run a program?
Most would run with the server program in ROM and the only ram is for data.