I found this somewhat disgusting. Basically, there was a company selling anti-virus software for windows, unix, and linux. Microsoft bought them out and immediately discontinued unix and linux support. The funny thing is, I just know that in one of their upcoming press releases, they will tout the fact that there are not many options available for anti-virus software on linux. Duh.

http://slashdot.org/articles/05/06/22/1751233.shtml?tid=109&tid=1

That's Micro$oft for ya. I mean really... Bill gates doesn't have nearly enough money yet.

Fortunately you don't really NEED anti-virus that much for Unix platforms. And I've heard there were better ones out there anyway.

Are there alot of Linux viruses? (sp?) I assuming no.

Not that I would buy linux AV software from MS anyway,

The point of *nix antivirus software isnt to protect the *nix boxes from viruses, its to protect Windows clients that are connected to *nix mail servers from Windows viruses.


There are other *nix antivirus packages, such as ClamAV (which is free).

OH NO MICROSOFT BOUGHT OUT A COMPANY AND RUINED IT THEY ARE AN EVIL SATAN WORSHIPPING CORPORATE GIANT

I don't dislike Microsoft for doing this. Why should I? It's business.

EDIT: The above logic does not apply to G4's buying out of TechTV.

And I'm sure you'll still be saying that when Microsoft starts jacking up prices.

I'm sure I will, because I never buy anything new from Microsoft. I'm still on Windows 2000, and their OS is really the only Microsoft product I use, and I already own a copy of that.
EDIT: Unless you mean prices for format licensing or whatnot, which I wouldn't really mind either because most formats I use either aren't owned by Microsoft or are public domain.

Is Microsoft really that bad?

I was about to make a thread about this, but this is as good a time as any. Microsoft, for all its flaws, is a decent enough company. It took a horizontal computer market (where there were different bands of computer with different types of hardware, and nothing was compatible with anything else) and turned it into a vertical market where there was a degree of compatibility for the first time.


MS did this with software code that they bought (or stole, depending on who you talk to) and they saw the opportunity and got in at the right time. After all, why build your own system when you can acquire someone else's, promote it better than they can, plus be able to get into the market with it before more competitors can, and save time and money on research and development since you didn't have to develop a new system from scratch? It makes perfect sense from a business POV.


While windows may not be the best system ever, the business system that Microsoft built to distribute it is the best that there is. In Business, your product can be inferior to the competition, but as long as your business system is good, you will see profit. I'm sure that any of us could make a better burger than what is sold at Mcdonalds (face it, a lot of mcdonalds food tastes like s***) , but we would be hard pressed to build a system that can sell billions of our better burgers. What Mcdonalds did for burgers, Microsoft did for computing. The product may be second rate and half-a**ed, but the system is second to none.

Linux is a great system and it has the ability to do it's job better than Windows, but there are several problems holding it back:

1. The distribution system. Most people have never heard of linux, and what people don't know about they won't buy. (i say buy b/c linux cannot effectively distribute itself in the mainstream and still stay free)

2. The complexity. The people who do know about linux are often confused and scared away about the different distributions and the lack of standardization. The average user wants something simple and streamlined that simply does what it's supposed to do without requiring the user to consult a manual very often. Without web-based support, I would be completely lost with linux, and I have to manually do things that windows would automatically do for me (like mount drives) unless I specifically configure these things to be automated. If Linux had an easy mode (that did all of the hard things behind the scenes and just let people get their work done) and an expert mode (which allowed endless tweaking) linux could possibly outflank microsoft windows.

3. Gaming support is embryonic. While it is possible to play
modern games on linux, it is by no means easy for the novice user. This needs to change.

I kinda disagree with some of your points.
1) The distribution system is fine. Everyone who wants Linux gets it, pretty much. I've yet to see anything to the contrary.
2) There are some distributions of Linux meant for beginners, I'm sure. If there aren't, there should be, and this would be a very easy goal.

The only thing that's holding back Linux right now isn't Linux itself but companies' willingness to develop/release for it. If companies saw Linux as having the potential that it does, and then decided to support it, Linux would be a lot more successful, I'm sure.

But I'm just stating the obvious at this point.

Pagewizard_YKS, you should do some research on them as a company. They have been hit with (and lost) so many lawsuits it's not even funny. They have been convicted of ILLEGAL business practices. So if you don't mind that companies do illegal things to get to their position, then sure, they are fine. But if you in fact think companies (and individuals) should obey the law in business, then ... uh... whatever.

Um, I'm not a business expert, but when someone buys out a company, doesn't the company have to ACCEPT? They caved in and sold to Microsoft...Microsoft can do whatever they want with it.

I'm sure the guys got really rich off the deal.

Hypercompuglobalmeganet.

Buy 'em out, boys!

I'm not saying that I support everything that MS does, but what they have accomplished in the past is impressive.

If you feel that illegally stealing property or forcing competing companies out of business is "impressive" then you would be right.

A company isn't evil because it buys out another. It is simply stronger in the competitive world. Natural selection.

Microsoft isn't a devil either. It just is a successful distributor that has a fair share of problems in certain arenas, but overall has a great record as a producer.

Monkey_Man: Pagewizard did not describe distribution as in the means of acquiring the OS (okay, then what distribution is he talking about?), but the marketing and targeting of the average computer user for an everyday, simple PC use of Linux. Here, the Linux devs need to work on if they want to spread what they see as god's OS (j/k).

Again, I'm not talking about that. I feel that MS should be at least reconized for playing a major role in standardizing the PC and for building the best business system. That's all.

Their actions in recent years are another matter.

Actually, I did. Linux is a great system, (better than winxp in some instances, but considerably worse in others) but it's current distribution system sucks compared to Microsoft. Linux mostly relies on word of mouth to distribute, (and boxed copies of distros like suse and redhat are sold in some stores for way less than windows) while microsoft has deals in place for most new PCs to ship with OEM copies of Windows. There's no comparison.

In it's current state, Linux has a hard time competing with windows b/c

1. it's too complicated for new users, as compared to winxp which is fairly straightforward

2. Linux is so obscure in that only a small group of people have heard of it and use it. Nearly everyone has heard of Windows and a lot more people use it than linux.

Hostile takeovers.

Ah, right.

I personally think Linux (or any other free Unix) should be taught in elementary school computer classes. Obviously, this would not solve this generations problems, but it would certainly help the next. They would understand the basic desktop manipulation for their Windows machines back home, but learn a bit more about the actual working of computers.

Tis indeed an intriguing idea: I'd love to have my kids unix/linux savvy from school.

Note to self: get kids...

<.<
>.>

(*humps Shintock*)

I put together a computer for my girlfriends kids, ages 8 and 11, and it's running linux

what distro?

Ubuntu. I don't really like it, I'm considering replacing it with straight debian. The problems I've had so far: The default gnome won't save screen resolutions. There is a very small choice of available packages, and a lot of core debian packages are not compatible. It gives root access to any user on the box as long as they retype their password (WTF!?).