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enderandrew
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Joined: 25 Oct 2005
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 Posted: Wed Jul 05, 2006 7:25 pm Post subject: |
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I beta test almost every Microsoft release. I can actually recall early betas of Windows XP that searched your HDD for MP3 files, converted them to WMA, etc. Windows XP would not play or work with MP3 files at all. They tried to completely force DRM down our throats before anyone else.
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Valkura
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Joined: 27 Feb 2006
Posts: 242
Location: Ramsey, MN
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| Posted: Wed Jul 05, 2006 8:30 pm Post subject: |
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| Stormblazer wrote: | Personally, I think Apple is much worse about forcing things on consumers than Microsoft ever was.
At least MS doesn't force hardware on you.
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Eh? I thought Apple was a hardware company 
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last.fm
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raptor5001
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Joined: 05 Jul 2006
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| Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 12:32 am Post subject: |
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[quote=enderandrew]I beta test almost every Microsoft release. I can actually recall early betas of Windows XP that searched your HDD for MP3 files, converted them to WMA, etc. Windows XP would not play or work with MP3 files at all. They tried to completely force DRM down our throats before anyone else.[/quote]
Actually this feature came with the XP powertoys lol...
But MS is trying to open up more, thank god. The new version of Office saves its documents in XML format? That is easily interpretable by other apps such as OpenOffice? Or was I misinformed?
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enderandrew
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Joined: 25 Oct 2005
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| Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 1:14 am Post subject: |
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Office 12/2007 uses an XML format and MS is going to make that format open. I don't know if OOO reads that format yet or not. I'm sure it will eventually.
Office 12/2007 however no longer saves to PDF since Adobe threw a fit, but they'll let OOO save to PDF with no lawsuit.
Is Microsoft being wronged for once?
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Q-collective
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Joined: 22 Mar 2004
Posts: 2076
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| Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 1:26 am Post subject: |
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| enderandrew wrote: | Office 12/2007 uses an XML format and MS is going to make that format open. I don't know if OOO reads that format yet or not. I'm sure it will eventually.
Office 12/2007 however no longer saves to PDF since Adobe threw a fit, but they'll let OOO save to PDF with no lawsuit.
Is Microsoft being wronged for once? |
Uhm, Adobe can't sue OOo because PDF is an open specification. OOo just wrote its own PDF support based on that specification.
Same story with the new msoffice xml format: xml is inherently "open" (unless you use some weird encryption or something) so writing support for it can be done in a matter of days.
Go go MS! |
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enderandrew
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Joined: 25 Oct 2005
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| Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 2:10 am Post subject: |
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But they did threaten lawsuit against MS. Either they have grounds for suing or they don't. Why sue one party and not the other?
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Q-collective
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Joined: 22 Mar 2004
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| Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 4:46 am Post subject: |
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| enderandrew wrote: | | But they did threaten lawsuit against MS. Either they have grounds for suing or they don't. Why sue one party and not the other? |
I'm not familiar on why Adobe wanted to sue MS. |
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olger901
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Joined: 17 Mar 2005
Posts: 625
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| Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 10:28 am Post subject: |
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| enderandrew wrote: | I have two very valid beefs with Microsoft.
1 - They stifle innovation by destroying competition. This leads to inferior products. They force people into exclusive contracts, buy out competitors, etc. US laws are meant to prohibit this behavior. People take them to court for antitrust violations, but the courts don't understand technology. So we get a court case about IE and WMP but no one cases about what Microsoft did to Java.
2 - They enforce their patents and standards like edicts from heaven, and refuse to follow the standards of others. If Microsoft actually cared about compatibility, interoperability and the like, then I can see people defending how they standarize things. But they don't.
Hell, they break their own APIs all the time. SP2 broke all kinds of apps. x64 breaks apps. And Vista will break apps. All will promise to run any Windows XP program, and none of them do 100% accurately. |
One of the games that won't run in Windows XP for example is: Emperor Battle for Dune, because it uses Direct3D Retained Mode, a feature that has been removed in Windows Vista. This while this game runs fine in wine with some minor modification...is wine gonna be more compatible then Windows will be in the future?   |
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justwantstohelp
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Joined: 29 Jun 2006
Posts: 251
Location: Sacramento, California
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| Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 10:31 am Post subject: |
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| The title of this thread should be, "Are we borrowing from OS X as much as we should be (see windows vista)." |
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Naib
Watchman
Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 6065
Location: Removed by Neddy
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| Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 11:25 am Post subject: |
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| olger901 wrote: |
One of the games that won't run in Windows XP for example is: Emperor Battle for Dune, because it uses Direct3D Retained Mode, a feature that has been removed in Windows Vista. This while this game runs fine in wine with some minor modification...is wine gonna be more compatible then Windows will be in the future? |
this game runs fine, there is a comunity patch to get it to work
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xef
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Joined: 20 Jun 2003
Posts: 460
Location: Porto - Portugal
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| Posted: Fri Jul 07, 2006 10:21 am Post subject: |
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| raptor5001 wrote: | | I think what we are forgetting here is that Linux is an open-source project and Microsoft is a multi-miollion dollar company. Microsoft, as a company, would never release Windows as open-source. Doing this would kill them, because no one would buy it from Microsoft. And you would have so many different versions of windows that the 'harmony' we experience now with Personal computers would be broken. Want to buy a program in Walmart for your Windows machine? Would be impossible, because how would they make it install WITHOUT compiling it to work with your specific version of windows. |
Sure, UT2k4 must be compiled for each linux distro |
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turtles
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Joined: 31 Dec 2004
Posts: 1696
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| Posted: Sat Jul 22, 2006 9:06 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: | andyfraser33 wrote:
noup wrote:
| Quote: | | So, you mean you would give a Linux Desktop system to a novice just as you would give him/her a Windows system? I quite disagree. |
I would, and have done.
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I was a novice and then some! I'll reply to that first post:
I am a "blue collar" electrician in 2002 I started a partnership, I had never owned a computer or gone to collage (for anything other than welding)
I asked a friend to set us up with a computer in exchange for some electrical work.
He aksed if - I wanted to purchace about $1200 in software
- Use illegal software
- or use linux
I immediatly threw out the idea of using illegal software, since it is illegal. I asked him about linux and he said it would be a steep learning curve compared to windows. I reminded him I had never used a computer and was not clear what "windows" was or what applications were. He asked if I cared what kind of linux. I said whatever you know best. He said Gentoo but might be even steeper learning curve, but it has good forums and is inline with my philosophy. He supplyed me with a nice looking basic box, I did not notice anything about booting. I have used openoffice, mozilla, natulis, gnome, kde, nano, emacs, kate, apache, cups, and terminals since. I started using the command line right away. Computer came with gentoo and a copy of "running linux" BY Matt Welsh and Lar Kaufman. I have a library card got some other books. I read 'man man' then other manual pages.
I can tell you I had a few problems- Emerge very slow over dial up, solved by getting dsl Need more bin packages maby?
- There was no spell checker in mozilla for editing web pages for a wile solved in mozilla 1.7.*
- etc-updating config files always resulted in a borked system & a service call from a computer person. I found cfg-update never had a problem since.
- I did not find any books on gentoo in library or book stores.
- No one seemed able to support gentoo here excypt my friend and a local linux users group, all of whom will not accept money. When they were (and are often) not available in time of need (read borked upgrade of some kind) a local unix/linux "expert" could not fix my system and gave up after 4 hours at $95/hr and sugested switching to suse linux.
- last but not least lack of a good accounting program we purchaced Appgen for linux for $250 and it broke after an update world and never worked again, it was closed source and no one could help, I did not understand closed source and no community til then, I think sql-ledger is close to quick books and really should be in portage
I later solved my problem and the unix expert seriously offered me a well paying job, but I like being an electrician.
I think Gentoo only needs a few things.
- More money, if Gentoo foundation paid developers like Daniel Robbins a fraction of what m soft could maby he/they would stay longer / do more?
If the average gentoo user donated 1/2 of what a 0sX upgrade cost I bet we would have 6 times better everything. - A hard copy manual or generic intro to linux using gentoo book. I did not get used to on line manuals til recently.
- Arch specific manuals, I think all the problems I have run into on a recent ppc install would have been solved if I knew to read the ppc FAQ first or if there was a ppc manual.
- ALSA support should be in main install manual, I never wanted to recompile everything once I got a working system just for sound.
- Smoother upgradeability for dummys (with the extra cash noted above or for a price), gcc 4.1.1, xorg -7 and kernel upgrades will take me weeks and I will put them off as long as possible.
- Gentoo could offer paid suport? Why not do what sql-ledger does and offer unlimited email suppoer for $90 per year?
- Why not offer a certification to offer local support, a local computer store could have a certified gentoo person on staff whom can come over to my office at $95/hr. I have considered expanding our service buisness by hiring a gentoo expert to offer somthing like that locally.
If I had not started in Gentoo - I would not have learned computers.
- I could have been sued since m soft targets small buisness for illegal software suits.
- I would be still paying for computer support, I tried to help some one install windows and could not get it to work, I had a hell of a time getting a friends windows box to print to a printserver.
- I would still be paying to have my website designed, I think compared to portage, bash, and cups.conf, FTP & HTML editing was a no brainer.
- I would be paying alot as our business grows (around $2700 + support costs) now that I have a gentoo ppc server, with cups, apache, egroupware ( still installing
 ), posrgresql, sql-ledger. - I do still have crashes inside programs but not a blank blue screen and never have lost data.
In addition I became aware of the social danger of one company having so much controle and the danger of closed source. I think open source software is now part of our cultural and social heritage and I am starting to think that the government should be using opensource for transparancy (recent election controvercys in US and mexico) and not spending tax dollars on closed source stuff if there is opensource available.
When I started using Mozilla I discovered on line banking, it did not work at my credit union, I called them they fixed it to work with mozilla the next day!
I share alot of documents with government agencys and other corporations, I added a "prefered file formats" to our contact us page on our web site. Without any furthur asking or interation I misteriously started getting attachments (resumes, spreadsheets, impress) in open document format from alot of people, eventhough ms format is fine, people take that really seriously in the buisness world.
One complaint: still cant find a good cad program qcad is hard to use.
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Last edited by turtles on Sat Jul 29, 2006 6:01 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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legine
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Joined: 27 May 2004
Posts: 555
Location: Germany
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| Posted: Mon Jul 24, 2006 10:03 am Post subject: |
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turtles, you are 
| Quote: |
Office 12/2007 uses an XML format and MS is going to make that format open. I don't know if OOO reads that format yet or not. I'm sure it will eventually. |
Since the Open Document foundation is promising a plugin for MS and different American States have announced that they will switch to the openDocument format if the plugin is released, MS is under pressure.
I think what will hapen in the format sector depends on which format will be accepted by the big guys.
Is it Open Document format over the MS XML thingy it will be doubt full that Open Office will bother about releasing a reader for MS XML. If the MS XML Format will get accepted by a concidering amount of people. They may include it.
In the Document format sector open Source is currently in the direct "confrontation" with MS.
I personly think that MS will try to push their format and if that is not working out they will grumblingly join Open Document Foundation. So this will be the first direct standoff between MS domain and advanceing Open Source Domain. Lets see what the future brings
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bakaohki
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 14 Jul 2005
Posts: 129
Location: Hungary
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| Posted: Sat Aug 26, 2006 8:12 pm Post subject: keep up with what? |
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| Quote: | | What are we going to do to keep up with longhorn? |
I just love the optimism of Linux people, really. Its like comparing a tiny boat to a jumbo jet, saying hey, we can go rafting and stuff  Maybe I would raise a sunken smile reading this on the Suse/Fedora forum (tiny laugh with Ubuntu), but here...
Just make Gentoo more stable, increase testing a bit and most of us would be happy. As for Linux: hardware support is a pain in the back, software availability is a nightmare, ui consistency is lacking, administering is terrible - basically these things have nothing to do with Gentoo, but they keep people from switching to Linux. |
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Q-collective
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Joined: 22 Mar 2004
Posts: 2076
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| Posted: Sat Aug 26, 2006 11:17 pm Post subject: Re: keep up with what? |
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| bakaohki wrote: | | Quote: | | What are we going to do to keep up with longhorn? |
I just love the optimism of Linux people, really. Its like comparing a tiny boat to a jumbo jet, saying hey, we can go rafting and stuff Maybe I would raise a sunken smile reading this on the Suse/Fedora forum (tiny laugh with Ubuntu), but here...
Just make Gentoo more stable, increase testing a bit and most of us would be happy. As for Linux: hardware support is a pain in the back, software availability is a nightmare, ui consistency is lacking, administering is terrible - basically these things have nothing to do with Gentoo, but they keep people from switching to Linux. |
Making Gentoo more stable is an ongoing work.
As for your complaints about Linux: hardware support is actually quite nice these days, we have a lot of software, our UI is way more consistent then Windows' and administration has been made easy with nice GUI tools, for example YaST. So I have honestly no clue what you're talking about really. |
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Dralnu
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Joined: 24 May 2006
Posts: 1919
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| Posted: Sun Aug 27, 2006 2:55 am Post subject: Re: keep up with what? |
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| Q-collective wrote: | | bakaohki wrote: | | Quote: | | What are we going to do to keep up with longhorn? |
I just love the optimism of Linux people, really. Its like comparing a tiny boat to a jumbo jet, saying hey, we can go rafting and stuff Maybe I would raise a sunken smile reading this on the Suse/Fedora forum (tiny laugh with Ubuntu), but here...
Just make Gentoo more stable, increase testing a bit and most of us would be happy. As for Linux: hardware support is a pain in the back, software availability is a nightmare, ui consistency is lacking, administering is terrible - basically these things have nothing to do with Gentoo, but they keep people from switching to Linux. |
Making Gentoo more stable is an ongoing work.
As for your complaints about Linux: hardware support is actually quite nice these days, we have a lot of software, our UI is way more consistent then Windows' and administration has been made easy with nice GUI tools, for example YaST. So I have honestly no clue what you're talking about really. |
Amen. Unless you are using closed-source, bleeding-edge software that is a hell of alot more then most people need, then you'll be fine. Something comes out, ~6 months and it has support (more or less. Legal issues sometimes here).
UI inconsitent? WTF is he talking about? Talking about nor having one standard GUI? Lets see, Fluxbox, Openbox, Kwin, GNOME/nautalus are the big ones...
Administering is terrible. I find that humorous (though I see why one would say that). Sys admining is a nightmare on most systems. With Linux, though, you have the tools you need to do it out of the box instead of having to spend ~1k for software to do it for you/help you do it. Course, I've gotten used to playing admin on my own box, and its almost second nature right now..
Cronjobs ftw!
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Carlo
Developer
Joined: 12 Aug 2002
Posts: 3356
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| Posted: Sun Aug 27, 2006 12:38 pm Post subject: |
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| turtles wrote: | | [*]last but not least lack of a good accounting program we purchaced Appgen for linux for $250 and it broke after an update world and never worked again, it was closed source and no one could help, I did not understand closed source and no community til then, I think sql-ledger is close to quick books and really should be in portage |
Die you take this company's support into account? Unless it's completely crappy I doubt this applciation doesn't run on Gentoo.
| turtles wrote: | | [*] Gentoo could offer paid suport? Why not do what sql-ledger does and offer unlimited email suppoer for $90 per year? |
Unlimited email support for $90? Depending where you live this may equate from a half to one work hour. Tracking down arbitrary problems on a distro is extremely complex and time intensive. Not a business plan to finance a normal living.
| turtles wrote: | | If I had not started in Gentoo [...] I could have been sued since m soft targets small buisness for illegal software suits. |
You use a free distro. That doesn't mean every piece of code is free of liabilities. You use Gentoo in a commercial environment, so you should care about licensing of mp3 and other mpeg codecs, if you use relevant libraries. You hopefully have built freetype with the bindist use flag enabled, otherwise you may be suited as well. Granted, the chance that this happens is not that high, but using a community distro, you're responsible not to violate patent rights. There is no company behind, that is responsible to care (and pay) for its product.
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Sunnz
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Joined: 18 Jun 2005
Posts: 370
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| Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 1:28 pm Post subject: Why worry about Vista? |
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There have been a thread about what should Gentoo do to compete with Vista... but think about it, Vista is pretty much copying OSX and Linux in genernal, with their "Aero" thing, putting home directories in a folder called Users, askes you to click on allow before it installs anything... it is pretty much they are the one who needs to catch up, IMHO Linux shouldn't have to worry about it at all!!
If anything, I think Linux should look at Leopard instead!! Has anyone seen the WWDC 2006? I think the Time Machine thing in Leopard is really , really cool!! Is that possible at all on Linux given all the interleaving/dependent packages and all?
Other than that, I think the only thing Linux would seek is better integration with hardware vendors like NVIDIA, NETGEAR etc. Get them to open their specification or something so even if they don't/no good at making drivers for Linux, at least we can do it ourselves and probably does a better job anyway! Otherwise, who cares about Windows?
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runningwithscissors
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Joined: 21 Apr 2006
Posts: 454
Location: the third world
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| Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 1:44 pm Post subject: Re: Why worry about Vista? |
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| Sunnz wrote: |
If anything, I think Linux should look at Leopard instead!!
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No. |
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KrAmEt
n00b
Joined: 19 Sep 2006
Posts: 50
Location: Louisville, KY
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| Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 2:35 pm Post subject: Re: Why worry about Vista? |
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| Sunnz wrote: | Vista is pretty much copying OSX and Linux in genernal
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thats M$ for ya!! |
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vibrokatana
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Joined: 09 Feb 2006
Posts: 328
Location: o0o0oo
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| Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 2:40 pm Post subject: |
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tar = time machine
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tabanus
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Joined: 11 Jun 2004
Posts: 638
Location: UK
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| Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 3:13 pm Post subject: Re: Why worry about Vista? |
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| Sunnz wrote: | | Other than that, I think the only thing Linux would seek is better integration with hardware vendors like NVIDIA, NETGEAR etc. Get them to open their specification or something... |
Just how do you suggest we do that?
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Sunnz
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Posts: 370
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| Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 3:25 pm Post subject: Re: Why worry about Vista? |
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| tabanus wrote: | | Sunnz wrote: | | Other than that, I think the only thing Linux would seek is better integration with hardware vendors like NVIDIA, NETGEAR etc. Get them to open their specification or something... |
Just how do you suggest we do that? |
I honestly don't know, that's why I suggested it maybe if we think about it, we'll come up with a solution.
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Ctrl+Alt+Del
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Joined: 04 Jul 2004
Posts: 326
Location: .de
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| Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 4:00 pm Post subject: |
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opening technical specs is simply not going to happen.
a.) they fear beeing copied
b.) they fear beeing sued for all those technical details that happen to be patented by someone else. |
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Q-collective
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Joined: 22 Mar 2004
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| Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 4:20 pm Post subject: |
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| Ctrl+Alt+Del wrote: | opening technical specs is simply not going to happen.
a.) they fear beeing copied
b.) they fear beeing sued for all those technical details that happen to be patented by someone else. |
A is not a fear, their stuff is being protected by patent laws and copyrights stuff. Besides, if they wanted to copy it, it makes much more sense to put a given piece of hardware under a microscope then try to figure what cool hardware it has by looking at its driver or just even the specification.
B is probably a reasonable fear.
There is another "fear", C: The hardware manufacturer uses technology that is patented and can't just be released.
At any rate, this is a dupe.
Edit:
Thanks for merging it kallamej
Last edited by Q-collective on Mon Sep 25, 2006 4:28 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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