[Deleted]

[ORANGE]

ORIGINAL: Nemesis

ORIGINAL: ORANGE
MS is certainly targeted because they are big. Yes they are trying to make a profit but so are Linux DEV's to one extent or other. I think Linus himself draws a nice salary.

Linus draws an "OK" salary, but he's not some multi-millionare you make him sound like. He received some stock-options back in the day (from Red Hat IIRC), and he used those to buy his family a house. I HAVE seen his house (no, not personally, but still), it's a nice middle-class (maybe upper middle-class) house. Not a palace or anything like that.

Apple wanted to keep everything proprietary. Sell mice for $30 to $45 each.

I bought a Microsoft-mouse few months back that cost about that amount....

Sell their systems for $5,000.

Um, that's what computers cost back then....

I was talking about buying an Apple mouse in the late 80's and I did not have a choice. I had to buy from Apple. Now thanks to MS I have a choice of many vendors.

As for Linus he made good money from IPO's and as a nail in his coffin he worked for Transmeta when they were developing the Crusoe chips and they were not open source. So if open source was so great why does he not support it?

$$$$$$$$?

[ORANGE]

ORIGINAL: Marc Schwanebeck

Orange, you should keep in mind the MS just does the software (and some input devices, a console, and a lousy mp3 player) and Apple delivers the full package. MS never had the intent to develop the whole package, and thanks god they did not but left it to other developers that knew what they were doing [:'(]

If the solution was as good and fairly priced as you state then there is no doubt in my mind that Apple would be the huge behemoth now and MS would have gone the way of BeOS and OS/2.

That's exactly why so many people switch today. It's not overpriced, you get the full package from one developer, a quality one too, and on top of it can run Windows natively on it [;)]. Apple switches more and more from the prosumer to the consumer market, at the same time still offering highend workstations. Intel/ Windows based prosumer boxes were also very expensive in the 80s.

There's a lot of 3rd party devices and peripherals that are not Apple and there always have been. You always had the choice, it is just that some people think you do not have simply because "it is an Apple".

I have a long experience in both worlds, Win and Apple. I don't simply close my eyes to one side or the other.

I am not saying MAC's are bad. I think they are good but I wonder what they would cost if there were no competition? If MS did not open up the hardware market? A large and diverse hardware market from which Linux benefits from today.

MACS and Linux are OK and so is Windows. Certainly MS has done more to getting computers and Internet into more homes than MAC or Linux.

[Marc von Martial]

ORIGINAL: ORANGE
I wonder what they would cost if there were no competition? If MS did not open up the hardware market? A large and diverse hardware market from which Linux benefits from today.

Macs always had competition, as have Dells and Acers and whatnot. Competition is no news to Apple. When comparing prices, make sure you not compare the cost of a homeuser box to a workstation price.

Certainly MS has done more to getting computers and Internet into more homes than MAC or Linux.

Yes, they somehow got the funding and jumped on intellectual property and product inventions of Apple / Macintosh [;)][:'(]

[leastonh1]

ORIGINAL: ORANGE
So basically Linux is a good solution if you wish to compose and send email, create documents and worksheets and browse the Internet. No wonder why you have no problems with it. You use Windows for the heavy lifting.

If you say so Orange. I wasn't aware of you looking over my shoulder when I'm working at my PC.

I'm a (new) database developer and (old) programmer using cross platform solutions, for the moment. You have no clue what I do with Windows or Linux on a daily basis and to make sweeping assumptions (as above) based on my one sentence says it all really.

I'm going to bow out of this discussion as you seem to know vastly more than I about my life and IT in general. [8|]

Regards,
Jim

[Nemesis]

ORIGINAL: ORANGE

I was talking about buying an Apple mouse in the late 80's and I did not have a choice.

You are talking about ADB-mice? IIRC, there were third-party mice available back then.

Now thanks to MS I have a choice of many vendors.

Thanks to MS? Did you forget all those other companies, like Logitech?

As for Linus he made good money from IPO's

Um, so? He didn't ask for those options, he was given them, since Red Hat made money from something he started. Are you saying that in order for him to be a true supporter of free and open source software, he should not make any money at all, anywhere?

and as a nail in his coffin he worked for Transmeta when they were developing the Crusoe chips and they were not open source.

Crusoes were supported by Linux just fine. What are you talking about? Are you referring to the fact that their initial developement was done in secret?

So if open source was so great why does he not support it?

yes he does. Could you provide some examples that prove that he does not?

You seem to oppose the fact that there are people and companies earning money with Linux. Why? What's wrong with that?

[Nemesis]

ORIGINAL: ORANGE
I am not worried about my current operating system supporting the older hardware. To buy some of the older hardware used sometimes cost more than to buy the new hardware new.

Who said anything about buying old hardware? I was talking about USING older hardware. You know, quite often old hardware works just fine. Should we upgrade to new hardware just because Windows does not support it anymore?

And while Linux may have drivers for a lot of devices I have to wonder if all of the features on these devices are fully supported.

Why woulnd't they be?

[Nemesis]

ORIGINAL: Knuckles_85

Good luck gaming with Linux. I can't speak for Matrix all the different flavors Linux is a development nightmare. Microsoft was revolutionary when it came out with Direct X. Without the standardization of dealing with those Graphical API's we would be in the dark ages of gaming.

There's nothing "revolutionary" in DirectX. And as far as graphics are concerned, we had OpenGL long before we had Direct3D.

Linux does have anything like that that's why you see so few Linux based games.

Um, yes it does. OpenGL, OpenAL, SDL... The reason you see few Linux-games is basically the size of the market.

As for Macs, I know with my PC I can go to any store I want to and say give me that mouse and that keyboard and it will work no matter if I'm using Windows 3.1 or Windows Vista.

Good luck getting an USB or Bluetooth-mouse to work on Windows 3.1 .

Do you believe that Macs use some kind of Apple Uber-mice or something? No, they use normal USB mice and keyboards. I have used several different keyboards and mice (including Micrsofot, Apple and Logitech) with my Mac and I have never had any problems. My current mouse is Microsoft Bluetooth mouse and I have no issues with it. Am I missing something here?

Mac alienated a lot of people early on and it came back to bite them in the ass.

Maybe it's high-time to let go of the past ?

[ORANGE]

ORIGINAL: Marc Schwanebeck

ORIGINAL: ORANGE
I wonder what they would cost if there were no competition? If MS did not open up the hardware market? A large and diverse hardware market from which Linux benefits from today.

Macs always had competition, as have Dells and Acers and whatnot. Competition is no news to Apple. When comparing prices, make sure you not compare the cost of a homeuser box to a workstation price.

Certainly MS has done more to getting computers and Internet into more homes than MAC or Linux.

Yes, they somehow got the funding and jumped on intellectual property and product inventions of Apple / Macintosh [;)][:'(]

Apple stole from Xerox right? Also Apple sued a company for producing clones. They produced the hardware. They were no open standard.

[ORANGE]

ORIGINAL: Jim_H

ORIGINAL: ORANGE
So basically Linux is a good solution if you wish to compose and send email, create documents and worksheets and browse the Internet. No wonder why you have no problems with it. You use Windows for the heavy lifting.

If you say so Orange. I wasn't aware of you looking over my shoulder when I'm working at my PC.

I'm a (new) database developer and (old) programmer using cross platform solutions, for the moment. You have no clue what I do with Windows or Linux on a daily basis and to make sweeping assumptions (as above) based on my one sentence says it all really.

I'm going to bow out of this discussion as you seem to know vastly more than I about my life and IT in general. [8|]

Regards,
Jim

Don't get so defensive. Why do you not tell me what you do on your Linux box. Are you running the database that you are developing for on your Linux box? Or are you just text editing on it?

All I am saying is people keep saying how Windows sucks but when it comes down to it they run the most complicated apps on Windows. Not Mac or Linux. That says it all. Sure if you are not doing anything that taxing then Linux is fine. Also Linux is GREAT if you are creating clusters or using it as a server. I have no argument with that. Most financial institutions use *nix based servers and apps.

But on the desktop when you have normal people trying to run complex programs Windows is king.

[ORANGE]

ORIGINAL: Nemesis

ORIGINAL: ORANGE

I was talking about buying an Apple mouse in the late 80's and I did not have a choice.

You are talking about ADB-mice? IIRC, there were third-party mice available back then.

Now thanks to MS I have a choice of many vendors.

Thanks to MS? Did you forget all those other companies, like Logitech?

As for Linus he made good money from IPO's

Um, so? He didn't ask for those options, he was given them, since Red Hat made money from something he started. Are you saying that in order for him to be a true supporter of free and open source software, he should not make any money at all, anywhere?

and as a nail in his coffin he worked for Transmeta when they were developing the Crusoe chips and they were not open source.

Crusoes were supported by Linux just fine. What are you talking about? Are you referring to the fact that their initial developement was done in secret?

So if open source was so great why does he not support it?

yes he does. Could you provide some examples that prove that he does not?

You seem to oppose the fact that there are people and companies earning money with Linux. Why? What's wrong with that?

Here this guy shares my views of the Crusoe.

http://www.infoworld.com/articles/op/xm ... calfe.html

Or maybe I share his? Maybe this is the article that I read all of those years ago.

I just cannot bring myself to say, no matter how popular, that Bill Gates is Satan and the open source community is selfless and good.

I think the truth for both of these lies in the middle and that they all are not far from each other at the end of the day.

[ORANGE]

ORIGINAL: Nemesis

ORIGINAL: ORANGE
I am not worried about my current operating system supporting the older hardware. To buy some of the older hardware used sometimes cost more than to buy the new hardware new.

Who said anything about buying old hardware? I was talking about USING older hardware. You know, quite often old hardware works just fine. Should we upgrade to new hardware just because Windows does not support it anymore?

And while Linux may have drivers for a lot of devices I have to wonder if all of the features on these devices are fully supported.

Why woulnd't they be?

No, not at all. You upgrade hardware because you want to do something you cannot do. Like play that new FPS with the nifty 3D graphics. If you do not want to upgrade hardware then the older software should work as well right?

[Nemesis]

ORIGINAL: ORANGE
No, not at all. You upgrade hardware because you want to do something you cannot do. Like play that new FPS with the nifty 3D graphics. If you do not want to upgrade hardware then the older software should work as well right?

Um, why? I might need or want the features and benefits new software offers, but I might be perfectly content with certain hardware I have. Why do you think that if I upgrade the software, I must upgrade the hardware as well?

[Nemesis]

ORIGINAL: ORANGE
Here this guy shares my views of the Crusoe.

http://www.infoworld.com/articles/op/xm ... calfe.html

Bob Metcalfe is well-known for disliking Linux and open-source. Will you be quoting Steve Ballmer, Darl McBride and Rob Enderle next for "insightful" comments regarding Linux and open-source? Hell, maybe I should rely on Richard Stallman for opinions about Microsoft and closed software?

But, to comment on the article... What's his point, really? That code-morphing in Crusoe should be open-source, and since it's not, it's somehow Linux'es fault? How come? Because Linus was an engineer at Transmeta? Linus was an engineer at Transmeta. He was in no position to decide on openness of code-morphing.

Seriously, the article makes no sense. For example: "Then Torvalds talked about commercial companies, which aren't so bad after all: Take for example Transmeta. His audience, packed with employees, friends, and family of newly public Linux companies, did not boo him back out into the barnyard.". So, Linux and Linux-users should hate commercial companies? Is that what he's saying? Why? It seems like Metcalfe shares the weird idea with you that Linux and commercial companies can't and shouldn't mix, and if they do, it somehow proves that Linux sucks. Where's the logic here? Where exactly is is written that "thou shalt not use Linux to earn money!"?

I just cannot bring myself to say, no matter how popular, that Bill Gates is Satan and the open source community is selfless and good.

I have made no claims regarding the theistic status of Bill Gates. But I can't see how someone could say that creating software and giving it for free to others is "selfish". Hate or like open-source, you must admit that giving free software to others is pretty selfless and good.

I think the truth for both of these lies in the middle and that they all are not far from each other at the end of the day.

Yes, they CAN be pretty far from each other. the difference became apparent right from the start. In the beginning, we had Bill Gates's "open letter to hobbyists", and on the other hand we had the GNU-manifesto. Those were more or less diametrically opposing viewpoints to the issue.