If you shout something loud enough and many people are saying it, does it become true? Some groups of people (include tech journalists and Linux advocates, such as Steven J. Vaughn-Nichols) have a psychological need to find Vista lacking. Mr. V-N has predicted that Vista will have all manner of problems, so his clear interest is to point out everything that is wrong with the OS. Who cares if he has to even make some stuff up? I followed some of the links on SJVN’s recent article, and I’d like to address some of them. I’m going to ignore all of the links about how it’s doing on the marketplace because I frankly care more about using an OS than about who else is using it. And I’m not going to address his self-referential links because I don’t put any stock in his objectivity. The following rebuttal is organized by the linked-to articles. I don’t care about the specific points SJVN is making… I just want to show that his data is suspect or perfectly explainable. Shutdown and startup issues:
The real source for this link is at ComputerWorld. Mary Jo Foley, a ZD blogger, adds little of her own to the article. The real article gives a mixed impression of the issue. Some people are fine and others have major problems. I have no problems, and I’m sure the people in the NT Performance labs fixed everything that they found, but one can only test on so much hardware. Between OEMs and people writing new drivers, the startup slowness can be fixed. In the mean time, take a look at my comment, which is based on this article by John Vert. Given some time for drivers and programs to improve, and some investigation, system times can be made quite reasonable. If some software is causing problems after drivers have stabilized, I suggest complaining loudly to the maker of that program or driver (especially if it’s Microsoft itself). I really don’t know why anyone would question using Sleep rather than Shutdown on a computer. Sure, sleep “masks” a sluggish shutdown response, but it achieves the same effect and solves the problem of disabling your computer when you don’t need it. If you need a really low-power off state, use hibernate. I’d like to see some justifications for why you want to shutdown rather than doing either of the above. The boot performance is not universally bad, as SJVN posits, and will undoubtedly get better as people start using the new performance diagnostics. Some Vista Features are annoying: Lance Ulanoff wrote an article in PCMag (a ZD publication) about annoyances in Vista. I’ll try to address his most salient points one by one. If you have issues with the points I skipped, surely it will be worked out in the forum. 1: Complaint about IE prompts for opening Word as an HTML editor: If you trust MSWord not to have bugs when opening HTML pages, then click on a button there and you’ll never be bothered again. In general, it’s hard to know if someone clicks on something and really intends to open an external application. If you want to be a little secure and are willing to sacrifice 1.5 seconds to open an external application, then leave it as default. If you use a particular application a ton, just disable the prompt for that application. It’s not a bad balance between security and usability. 2: Changing date and time: Why do you want to do this more than once? Just have your computer change time from the network time server (as is set by default). You may need to change time zone more frequently if you’re on the go, but this doesn’t require any elevations. 5: This guy lists as an annoyance that there’s no way to scroll left and right in the start menu programs view. He asks the question, “What happens if there’s a lot of nesting?” Unfortunately, the lazy guy would rather bash Microsoft than do a 2 minute experiment to see what actually happens by creating some folders in the start menu. I’ll leave it to those reading along to do the experiment… It’s really not that hard. 6: Serial support: welcome to 2007… I understand that it sucks when old hardware becomes unsupported, but serial has been unpopular for so long. He probably has an issue with the Wacom driver in Vista rather than the OS itself since the serenum.sys serial driver still exists and I guess it must work (I have no serial ports on my machine). That is what I was going to leave it at, but then I decided to do a bit of extra investigation… Oh, look here! Google’s first hit on “Vista Wacom serial tablet” is this! Once again, I will state that Lance is a lazy person. 7: Drivers: Drivers are a perennial complaint. I will not defend the indefensible by saying that he should be enjoying his experience with Vista drivers. I have no driver problems, because I’m using pretty Lo-Fi, standard hardware. Other people have problems. Writing Windows drivers is Hard Work, and the Kernel is generally a much less forgiving environment than User-Space. Backwards compatibility does not apply as much in this regime either, because the driver is part of the OS and is expected to participate in its synchronization and locking scheme. I expect this will get better with the advent of the User Mode Driver Framework and the Kernel Mode Framework. Both of these systems present a much cleaner interface to the driver writers. Of course, none of this applies to things like Chipsets and Video Adapters, which are much more central to the system. As far as I can tell, drivers in this area are written in very close cooperation with Microsoft. 8: Some problems he reported through Windows Diagnostics haven’t been solved yet? Boo hoo! Wait a few months and check back. It’s better than before, when there was no solution most of the time and no one ever knew there was a problem. FWIW, most of my problem reports offer reasonable advice (if the driver is missing, it tells me to check the manufacturer’s site… if a major program is crashing it gives a link to the latest version or to a KB article). 9: I don’t care about the games in Vista. On the chess thing, this guy just seems to have some vision problems. Frankly, throw-away complaints like this article are worthless to readers and to the people developing Windows. One of them (#5) isn’t even a problem but a question about what would happen in an easily testable situation. You’re always going to find someone who will complain about UI. Interface is something that everyone thinks they can understand, so everyone has an opinion to offer. It’s an example of bike shed painting. Vista has poor security: My approach to rebutting the security claims is to explain each of the vulnerabilities in detail. I hope to show that these bugs are rather complicated issues that are inevitable in any large software project. They have nothing in particular to do with Vista’s design and everything to do with its sheer size. Bugs like this exist in any OS, and no doubt SJVN seems to misunderstand the ANI vulnerability a bit. He thinks that it is in some “Program” of some sort that is vulnerable. In fact, it’s a component of the Windowing System that is loaded into every process (user32.dll). It doesn’t make much of a difference, because it is indeed a bug. After reading the real vulnerability report (which is two layers away from the article), one sees that it’s not some sort of design flaw but merely a small coding mistake (improperly validating a size field when opening a file). It’s kind of sad that they didn’t fix it right in the first patch, so I hope the tester responsible for investigating that code fix gets “reassigned.” On the other hand, this is not kernel-mode code and it’s not running in a system or trusted context. Sure, it’s bad, but that’s what patches are for. Unfortunately, this was an unlucky case that passed through the stack overflow protections, but Vista is less vulnerable to this under IE because any malicious code will have difficulty escaping from the IE protection context. There is only ONE bug in CSRSS, as far as I can tell from SJVN’s link, not three. This was that infamous MessageBox bug. The issue is a double-free of allocated memory in NtRaiseHardError or one of its called functions. The function has several paths of execution for dealing with error strings from the Virtual DOS Machine or from the kernel. It’s a little complicated by the fact that Windows may have to extract the error string from the memory of the process and move it to a different context in the case of the VDM. There’s a good write up at eEye Security. Once again, code bug and not design flaw. It’s pretty easy to see how this bug arose, because of some unexpected interaction between vastly different levels of abstraction within the Window Manager. The HardError function is used by deep parts of the OS to surface system errors and it just so happens that this is a convenient way to also display System-Modal error messages from service processes. How many times do you see System-Modal error boxes? This is just one of those crusty old areas of Windows that few people bang on, so rare and weird errors don’t really get caught. You’ve gotta have this stuff (I can hardly call an error reporting mechanism ‘bloat’), but you really don’t want to use it often. SJVN seems to think that Microsoft should have rewritten every single part of the OS. Not only would that be a colossal waste of time, but it would likely create many more security bugs than we’ve seen so far. There have been major changes in Vista: huge portions of the Kernel have been changed and rather massive features have been added. The graphics model is in the process of being entirely replaced (Aero and WPF are just halfway to where Windows is eventually going). There’s no real reason to rewrite already working stuff unless its design is bad or outdated. So far, we haven’t seen design flaws. Code bugs will always happen and they’ll eventually be caught and fixed. The only clear message I have picked up from reading SJVN’s security rants is that he does not have a technical understanding of that which he complains about. Security is a very difficult problem, however, and I’d like to explain why we cannot expect absolute freedom from exploits. Even in extremely life-critical engineering endeavors, like airplane design or even the space program, the cost of elimination all defects is too high. In these fields, every effort is made to get rid of problems through simulation, ground testing, flight testing, and general design checking. Even so, bugs slip through the cracks and aeronautical engineers have a process for managing faults. The Space Shuttle has auxiliary systems; airplanes have large margins of safety so that they can be landed even when missing half their engines or when some of their avionics fail. Also, the products of these engineering efforts are constantly maintained and checked for damage and wear. Any flaws that are later discovered are patched and if they are severe enough, the subsystem is redesigned and replaced on all instances of the product. No one is willing to pay enough for software to justify the costs of extremely stringent engineering. We could not have had the Computing Revolution if all personal computers had to be reliable enough to be used in a life support context. Moreover, the pluggable and configurable nature of computers makes it impossible to test every complete system. And in a real engineering discipline, if something is not tested it should be assumed to be broken. So we’ve now established that bugs will happen. Most bugs in an OS don’t have any really nasty effect, since OSes are designed with redundancy in mind (processes crash and get restarted, errors occur and are silently ignored, etc). On the other hand, even a single security bug has huge effects. You can’t really build too much redundancy around the issue… the best you can do is try to isolate the flawed code and prevent compromises from spreading to the rest of the system. This is also something that other engineering disciplines don’t have to deal with so much. Returning to Aeronautical engineering, they don’t even attempt to make planes that are safe under both normal conditions and under the bombardment of rockets. The best you can do about security issues is testing and review. A lot of this is done by Microsoft. For example, almost every new file format parser they produce is subjected to fuzz tests, which randomly mutate the parse stream to ensure that errors are properly caught. The result: Microsoft does not appear very often on this list of Kernel bugs, which are mostly the result of fuzzing attacks; IE also handles these sorts of fuzz attacks quite well. But it only takes one such exploit to have widespread chaos and compromise of many PCs. Sure, security on Windows is not flawless. But, we have come a long way from 2002, when there were massive internet worms and you could rightly say that Microsoft had a huge security problem. People keep repeating the lie that Windows has Swiss-cheese security and is easy to exploit. If you wish to deny this, I’d like to see technical details about what areas you think are insecure and why. Also, it would be a bonus to explain how you might fix the problem without entirely breaking what works. From this point on, hardening Windows is just a matter of iterative improvements to the OS (read: monthly patches), as is the case with any other open system. We could argue either way about the speed of patching, but this is not a very exciting argument and it’s more important to look at the speed at which patches are distributed than the time it takes to create them, in my opinion. As we saw in the big Sasser and Blaster fiasco, the most dangerous time is between patch creation and widespread deployment. Conclusion My rant may seem like it’s focused against Steven J. Vaughn-Nichols, but that’s not really what this is about. I’m tired of the endless spewing forth of uninformed, technically wrong, and ultimately boring opinions about Microsoft products. MSFT may not be as nimble as Apple or as well-regarded as Google, but they still have large cadres of talented engineers. I don’t care that much either way about their corporate practices, but I do care about the design of their products and how those features compare to competitive products. What I really long for is more enlightenment on the web, and OSAlert in particular, about the topics of discussion. People may not know all of the technical details of the systems they use or the systems they don’t use (I’m looking at you, Linux advocates), but I think it would be a much more worthwhile and spirited exercise to try to learn about how things work as a community. As OS Enthusiasts, we grow more from sharing our informed opinions than by sharing strident ignorance. About the Author
PlatformAgnostic is recovering from writing a filesystem for his OS class. If you have a strong technical grasp of a non-Windows Operating System and wish to do a joint article comparing and contrasting some core areas of your system with Windows, please contact him. Some topics I’d like to discuss are filesystems, debugging support, IPC mechanisms, VM design, kernel synchronization, I/O architecture, or anything else of this nature.
If you would like to see your thoughts or experiences with technology published, please consider writing an article for OSAlert.
“Well, obviously you do care enough to write a three page article about it…”
Let me correct myself:
Obviously you do care enough to write a three page rant full off fanboy whining about it…
Really, what kind of “articles” osnews deems worth publishing is beyond me.
Edited 2007-04-23 19:33
Damn, this sounds almost like Get-The-Facts. I don’t really like SJVN’s articles either, but some of the points he brought up are quite fair. For instance:
* It’s not my case, but I do know people who change their date and time quite frequently for the simple fact that they travel abroad with their laptops and they don’t always have immediately-available Internet connections. As far as I’m concerned, it’s a pretty fair point, and I’m sure this is the kind of people who would complain about a poorly designed Date&Time window.
* There are a lot of people who do need a serial driver. I, for one, need one that works well because I often used the serial port for development reasons (e.g. interfacing with SBCs). I realize that Microsoft doesn’t really care about what their customers need, but “there aren’t *THAT* many people who need serial ports” is a very lousy excuse.
* I do prefer to shut down my computers when I have to, for a lot of reasons. When my hdd is getting claustrophobic, the last thing I need is Vista taking up some space to hibernate. If I know I won’t be working on my laptop for several days, I don’t want it to sleep for even a second (I don’t care about “saving some battery power” — if it consumes even the smallest amount, it’s not good for me), I don’t want it to hibernate (for hdd space reasons), I want it to shut down for good. Even if I didn’t have any practical reasons for prefering to shut down my computer over sleeping/hibernating, I still wouldn’t care. What I do with my computer is my choice, and I could hardly care less about what the Vista development team thinks I should do with it. “Vista is slow to boot and shut down but you won’t need that anyway” is another poor excuse.
Pointing a finger at Linux advocates for not knowing the technical details of the OS-es they don’t use is a bit too much. Linux advocates know about Windows just as much as Windows advocates know about Linux. Besides the fanboy-ism which you’ll obviously find in any camp, most of the fair points which were brought up against Vista before it was released really stood up.
Who said that serial ports do not work anymore? I don’t have one, so I couldn’t test anything myself… that was my primary point there. Now, the issue that Lance had with his Wacom tablet was in the Wacom driver and there was an easy solution for it found by googling.
If you travel, you change time zones… this is different from changing the system time (which affects the timestamps put on files on the hard drives and appointments on your calendar and stuff). Time zones can be changed by any user (maybe not Guests). I just tested this on Vista and it works… have you done any even rudimentary checks before writing your response?
I don’t think bootup is that sluggish. I was responding to the question in Mary Jo Foley’s blog entry about hibernate and sleep “masking” a sluggish bootup. My response is that bootup is pretty reasonable, and hibernate and sleep are much faster. If you really don’t have space or battery, don’t use the faster means.
Edited 2007-04-23 21:06
“””
Linux advocates know about Windows just as much as Windows advocates know about Linux.
“””
It all depends upon who you are talking about, of course. But I would wager that Linux advocates, in general, know more about Windows than Windows advocates know about Linux.
I suspect that the average Linux advocate knows more about Windows than a significant portion of the Windows advocates.
I would further generalize, and say that the average user of any Non-Microsoft OS knows quite a bit more about Windows than the average Windows user, simply out of necessity.
Note that I did switch around a bit between “advocate” and “average user” there. And nowhere did I address that class of multi-platform aware people that OSAlert attracts. So be careful to note that I am not calling eclectically educated Windows advocates stupid.
Edited 2007-04-23 22:37
PlatformAgnostic, I have seen the serial driver performing badly on some systems myself. It was around the time I read SJVN’s article and (having some problems digesting his articles myself) and I was convinced it was not Windows-related, but it does happen to work perfectly well with Linux.
My problem with Windows and timezones (and why I’d rather change the time than the timezone) is related to what timezone really means. I’m not sure if this is leftover in Vista, but it’s a habit I’ve had since Windows 98 I think, and which remained in 2000 and XP. The notion of “timezone” is strictly related to time (something I got used to from *nixes), but when I change my timezone in Windows, it also understands that I am changing my location as well — so that it changes my local currency, decimal commas into dots and so on, which I simply don’t want.
As far as I’m concerned, I was never bothered with boot times because I actually caught not just the days when it took a few seconds to boot into BASIC but also about two minutes to boot a crawling OS on slow hardware. However, remember that Microsoft promised incredibly fast boot times. To whom were they promising that, I do not know, but any Gentoo or FreeBSD user will laugh at anything longer than 15 seconds.
Don’t get me wrong, SJVN (and MJF, in some aspects) really *should* open their minds — what I really mean to say is that much of Microsoft’s advertising is seriously inflated. Not that it would be a solitary practice the likes of Apple don’t do — but it still holds. I don’t think there was a single piece of software not to be unfairly criticized.
But if you look at many of the points that were brought even before Vista got final, you’ll see how most of the criticism comes from users of other platforms. I didn’t trust them too much either (the same happened with Windows XP a few years ago). I did manage to understand these critics because I haven’t used Windows consistently myself, and next to none of Vista’s “novelties” were anything new to me.
Nevertheless, this doesn’t justify unfair criticism, which is something about which I agree with you :-).
Most people don’t seem to care about facts. Why do I care?
Because I respect some of the people working on Windows and some who have developed it. There are serious screw-ups in there, but the Kernel mechanisms invented by Dave Cutler are quite well-designed with the lessons learned from UNIX and other systems.
The USER subsystem that Raymond Chen and many others have worked on has many warts and compatibility hacks, but it was for a long time the fastest way to draw a desktop to the screen.
The distributed file system, which was partly written (in its original form) by Larry Ostermann solved problems that the Unix world left to applications, much to the detriment of portability and correctness (do you like those .nfs files that appear when doing shares? or the necessity of creating .lock files everywhere?).
I care because, although I haven’t met these people, I realize that they are engineers to look up to and not some organs of a corporate leviathan. I care because I don’t want to see other students be seduced by the “worse is better” mentality that many UNIX denizens espouse.
Edited 2007-04-23 21:20
I care that I had to buy a cheap PC today for my ex’s parents, and that I couldn’t get a single one with XP at the local Future Shop. I didn’t have time to shop around, unfortunately, so I had to pick one up with Vista.
I care that it took two and a half hour to reinstall it in French (while installing a language pack in Linux takes less than a minute). I care that it is extremely sluggish for a 512MB system, while it could really fly with a lighter system on it.
I care that it took two minutes and 25 seconds to boot into a working Vista desktop, while it took two minutes and 10 seconds booting into Kubuntu 7.04…from a live CD! I also care that the system was more responsive from the LiveCD for simple tasks (like exploring files, surfing the web, moving windows around and the like).
I care that I didn’t have access to the Samba shares on my LAN because the new PC came with Home Basic. Or maybe you can, but I couldn’t find it because they changed the control panel UIs again.
This was my first contact with Vista. I’ve installed and used a large variety of MS OSes in my time: Windows 3.1, 95, 98, 2000 and XP. This was by far the most disappointing one (then again, I never installed ME). Sure, some great engineers work for MS, and they have my respect. That still doesn’t make Vista a great Windows release. For starters, all the backwards compatibility cruft are making it incredibly bloated.
Look at it this way: if it was such a great product, there wouldn’t be *that* much negative opinions about it. The engineers may not be to blame (I personally think the responsibility lies above them), but that doesn’t change the basic fact: the “Wow” is elsewhere.
512 MB is too little RAM for Vista. Maybe if you turn Aero off, it might be okay, but I don’t think anyone (besides Microsoft) will tell you that 512 is enough. I’m not going to defend the indefensible.
I also don’t think the language situation is perfect. But if you needed the OS in French, why was it in English in the first place? This doesn’t help you, but enterprises can get multilingual packs that can be installed on a per-user basis… you also get these if you buy Ultimate edition. If not, I guess you’re consigned to reinstalling the OS.
Well, obviously HP and Future Shop believe that 512MB is enough, since they sell the systems. As I said, FS no longer sold any systems with XP (none from other OEMs either). How is the average consumer supposed to know that the *new* PC he’s buying is not powerful enough to adequately run the OS it’s shipped with?
The bigger point, of courses, is that Vista *should* be able to run on 512 MB. 512MB, while not that much, is still quite a lot of memory. XP runs very well on such a system – I find it mind-boggling that MS, with all its talented engineer, wasn’t able to produce an advanced OS that could run with that amount of memory.
I was almost tempted to leave the Kubuntu LiveCD in the CD-ROM tray and not tell my ex’s parents…
Um, because that’s what they were selling at the store? Hey, I know some of this criticism is not MS’s responsibility, it’s the OEM’s and the store’s, but what is the average consumer going to think? He’s going to be staring at his computer screen for two and a half hours, wondering why it takes so long (why *does* it take so long, incidentally? It takes less than 20 minutes to install the whole Kubuntu OS…). Oh, and after these two and a half hours, it’s another forty-five minutes of updates before you have a completely ready system…great!
There’s no real engineering reason to require a reinstall if you want a different language…it’s a business reason, and these are what plague Windows the most, in my view. It’d be a great OS if it was open-sourced, and didn’t have to serve to maintain MS’s revenue stream. I won’t even mention the times when you need more than one language on the same computer…
Yes, and the Ultimate version was worth as much as the PC I was buying. This was not an option for the future owner.
I bought a brand new Acer two weeks ago that came with Vista Home Basic.
It’s an Athlon XP X2 4000+. Decent system all around, came with 512mb of RAM.
Vista took over two minutes to boot (and no, this was not “First boot”). The first bootup was a two hour ordeal (mostly due to crapware)…
When I finally cleared all the junk off, it still took almost two minutes to boot up to a usable desktop (meaning the hd wasn’t grinding like it was about to explode anymore).
After trying out IE7 (I was going straight to d/l Firefox), while simultaneously trying to browse the control panel to get a feel for it, and my computer practically locking up trying to do both, I realized enough was enough.
Vista wasn’t much prettier (after all, I guess my brand new computer just isn’t powerful enough to render the awesomeness that is VISTA)
After fighting with it for a few hours, I tossed my Feisty RC install cd in. It installed in about 20 minutes. Updated in another 20 or so. And I was able to install codecs, Nvidia drivers, etc in another 20 or so.
In that hour I had everything working perfectly, quickly, and smoothly. My computer actually feels like MINE…Like I am in control. That’s how it should be. How it was in win95 on my compaq 2200 with 16mb of RAM and 1.8gb hd! Wow that takes me back.
Point is, Linux is not perfect. But what Microsoft has done is release a product that is even farther from perfect. A product that many of us are learning to despise.
Largest OS maker in the world, with a monopoly that is consistently abuses, with tons of what are supposed to be the best and brightest…And they churn THIS out?
Should have bought a Dell
They didn’t have any Dells under 500$CAN at the store (tax + extended warranty included). Even then, all the Dells had Vista on them.
If I hadn’t been in a situation where I needed to get the computer NOW, I would have shopped around town to find a place that still sold PCs with XP. As it is, the new owners will probably have to fork out more cash in order to get more memory (then again, maybe they’ll just learn to live with the sluggishness – they aren’t heavy computer users).
I care because I don’t want to see other students be seduced by the “worse is better” mentality that many UNIX denizens espouse.
We prefer “simpler is better.” Surely with enough talent and man-hours, you can create a gigantic tangle of complexity that manages to function as an operating system. But is that better than a set of simple components that fit together in a logical way?
Students learn UNIX because its design is comprehensible, elegant, and fundamental to understanding computer systems. They don’t learn Windows because there’s no reason to mimic its design. Maybe its feature-set, but not its design.
I’m sure there are countless top-notch developers working on Windows, and the kernel is actually pretty decent these days, but the platform as a whole is screwed. Microsoft can try their best to improve their code quality, but they cannot immediately abandon unfortunate design elements (e.g. the registry) or police their crappy third-party drivers and applications. You can’t put sour milk in the fridge and expect it to become drinkable.
What the Windows faithful don’t understand, and many of the Linux advocates as well, is that third-party software is what makes running Windows insecure and unreliable. I have no problem with third-party software as long as it’s open source, but I’ll only accept proprietary software if the vendor offers full support for their product. Microsoft can’t support the vast array of proprietary third-party software that its customers use, but when this crap fouls up their systems, it reflects poorly on them. People install a couple dozen applications that all disclaim any responsibility if anything goes wrong, and then when things go south, they blame Microsoft.
So excuse me if I’m not dying to see all sorts of third-party proprietary software on Linux, because the result will be much of the same. I like the fact that my software vendor supports nearly all of the software on my system, providing timely fixes and easy upgrades. If I use proprietary software, I have to live with the fact that flash might not work in a 64-bit browser or that the NVIDIA drivers might not work with the latest version of Xorg for months. I don’t try to file a class-action lawsuit when the proprietary drivers don’t work properly. I understand that with proprietary software, I’m at the mercy of the vendor, and if I don’t like the way their software works or what environments they support, there’s nothing I can do about it.
I find it amusing that journalists are going to such great lengths to rationalize the public’s general distrust of Microsoft or criticisms of Vista on technical grounds. In the end, it’s not UAC, DRM, WGA, or the various UI quirks that create the sentiment that Vista is simply more of the same from Microsoft. It’s just that everybody is fed up with the proprietary software industry screwing us over and making us deal with the mess. We can’t keep blaming Microsoft forever. We have to give credit where credit is due and point our fingers squarely at the proprietary vendors, particularly the graphics vendors. They suck at shipping good drivers for Windows almost as much as they suck at delivering them for Linux.
Thanks for a thought-out reply. You’re absolutely right about third-party binaries and their detrimental effect on the stability of the system. The applications I use the most on Windows are either written by Microsoft or Open Source, so I definitely live by your statement. I have no choice with drivers, but I’m lucky to have mostly intel hardware with pretty decent drivers.
I have a pretty strong philosophical difference with you on the nature of simplicity in the OS. The Linux/UNIX method of simplicity is great for certain tasks, like high-performance-computing and portable servers. It’s also great for bringing up new hardware, as you said in a recent post. But when it comes to making applications that have to have many interactions with the underlying system or which have to get a naturally complex task done, I think it’s better to put some intelligence into the OS.
File-locking in distributed filesystems is the first issue that comes to mind for me. Windows has a pretty interesting mechanism to do distributed locking in the SMB protocol. UNIX used NFS for quite some time, which didn’t even attempt to solve this problem, so it appears in applications. This is fixed in newer DFSes like NFSv4, but it’s an example of what I consider “worse-is-better.”
The registry is a Windows solution to setuid. It’s basically a filesystem for storing key-value pairs which can be ACLed separately from each other. It also has atomic operations and in Vista, MSFT has implemented ACID transactions on the registry so partial installs can be transparently rolled back. I’d see the registry as a design strength of Windows rather than a design flaw.
I’m sure you’ve seen this before. I don’t necessarily believe everything in here, but I think it’s pretty funny and accurate in areas:
http://www.simson.net/ref/ugh.pdf
I respect your opinion in general, and I’d like some specifics in areas where you think the Windows design is deficient. I’m sure I’ll agree with you on a lot of them, but the disagreements could be interesting. How would you feel about doing a joint OSAlert article? It could be high-quality.
Edited 2007-04-24 06:19
The Linux/UNIX method of simplicity is great for certain tasks, like high-performance-computing and portable servers… But when it comes to making applications that have to have many interactions with the underlying system or which have to get a naturally complex task done, I think it’s better to put some intelligence into the OS.
What I mean by simplicity is that a complex system is made up of simple and often interchangeable components that interface in a well-defined manner. Each component can be developed in loose coordination with its neighbors and completely ignorant of other components in the system.
The complexity isn’t in the components themselves so much as the way they fit together. This is why UNIX and free software has excelled in the server space, where systems are often logically structured as a stack of components. The choice of where to draw the lines and how the components communicate isn’t really that difficult in a stack.
But a desktop is more like a tree or even a more general form of graph. Some components form a sort of stack, others connect to a bus, some synchronize, others stream, and many participate in a combination of these relationships. Where to draw the lines and how to connect the dots is a harder problem, and as we watch the free software desktop develop mature technologies like DBUS and KParts, we see more powerful ways of connecting the components of the desktop becoming central pillars of the platform.
But as the componentized system that evolved in a distributed development environment becomes more powerful, or intelligent as you say, the complexity of each component stays in check, and the complexity of their relationships scales reasonably. The monolith forged in the halls of the Redmond campus, on the other hand, becomes harder and harder to maintain as new features creep in.
I shied away from your NFS comment before, but I’ll agree with you that NFSv3 had its shortcomings and that NFSv4 is arguably even worse overall. Of course, Linux and other UNIX-like systems have SMB and CIFS support, but that doesn’t mean that this is the best possible solution. There are other DFSs like Cargenie Mellon’s AFS and Coda, IBM’s GSA, and Red Hat’s GFS, among many others. Then there’s the trend of tunneling anything and everything through SSH to arrive at some interesting solutions like sshfs.
I have no problem with a registry in theory, such as the gconf registry in GNOME. But the Windows registry was subverted by malware authors early on, and Microsoft has seemed powerless to do anything about it. Maybe you could better explain how this happened, if you agree that the registry has become a weakness for Windows, that is.
I’m not sure about the concepts behind DBUS and KParts and what their stated advantages and design goals are. As far as I can tell, they are means for providing standardized methods for things which were left to convention in the UNIX world. When I get a chance, I’ll write a longer reply (or maybe I’ll attempt another article) looking at those two specific components and their equivalents on Windows. Also, I’m no Russinovich, so I don’t have all the details.
Why does the registry get “taken over”? Well, there are three or four different places in the registry that are used to configure auto-start programs. Maybe more. Malware puts keys here to auto-launch itself. This seems pretty equivalent to putting lines into the init.d scripts (or rc.d…). Or you can put lines into the xinit file or the kde/gnomeinit files. Or you could stick something into the startup script for some other popular system service.
I suppose with the registry change notification services, you could watch the auto-launch keys and replace them when they are removed. But you could use similar tricks using FAM on *nix.
The weakness in the registry could be the lack of privilege separation with regards to some keys. As some people have said, it might be worthwhile to grant an installer access to only the keys it needs in order to install rather than every administrative key on the system. But this is similar to the root/user divide on UNIX. The solution to this seems to be a capabilities-based OS. I hope this is something commercial and OSS people look at, but the cost might be higher than the payoff.
“What the Windows faithful don’t understand, and many of the Linux advocates as well, is that third-party software is what makes running Windows insecure and unreliable. I have no problem with third-party software as long as it’s open source, but I’ll only accept proprietary software if the vendor offers full support for their product. Microsoft can’t support the vast array of proprietary third-party software that its customers use, but when this crap fouls up their systems, it reflects poorly on them”
Hear Hear. I think poorly written drivers are one of the biggest problems for Windows, follow a BSOD, and you’ll usually end up with a 3rd party driver. Add on top of that AV software (with hooks into the kernel), spyware scanners, and the user running as Admin, and you have a recipe for disaster.
“I care because I don’t want to see other students be seduced by the “worse is better” mentality that many UNIX denizens espouse.”
If you’re going to make inflammatory statements like that you better put in some effort to explain exactly what you mean. Who says worse is better? Why is it worse?
You are right that much of the work being put in Windows is high-quality. They have to live with a huge amount of obsolete code, but they manage quite well.
Still, whether it is all right or not, and no matter who is to blame (notice many windows haters now say linux is insecure because a out-of-tree driver had a security problem, fixed 4 months ago), Vista isn’t that great. It might need time to mature, right, but it took ’em 5 years to get it out of the door, and it still isn’t stable nor much more usable (in hindsight, XP wasn’t that bad…).
And no matter how great Windows technically is or will be, Microsoft still doesn’t care about their users, implements all kinds off freedom-limiting technology and uses unfair and market-value destroying strategies to keep their monopoly. The company might not be ‘true evil’ but it sure is bad for humanity right now, and thus I considder it unethical to use, sell or promote their software.
Still, facts matter, so in that sense, your article is appreciated.
I bet journalists have a template they use each time a new version of Windows gets released.
They just had to change the 98 to XP to Vista without ever changing the content of the articles.
That only works because Windows really hasn’t changed much for years. The first thing I noticed when I fired up Vista was how much it looked and felt exactly like XP. Notepad, Paint, so many of the configuration dialogs, all of it looks and feels very much like XP. After 5 years of development on Vista they still haven’t found time to improve Notepad or Paint? Lots of people actually use those basic tools and having a few more features thrown in would really help.
This article reminds me of the move from 2-dimensional calculus to 3-dimensional calculus. It involves a whole lot of z’s.
He hates Debian almost as much, if not more, than Microsoft. See his recent “Does Anyone Care” article about Debian to see what I mean. BTW, there are some nice, reasoned responses to that piece:
http://www.linux-watch.com/news/NS3656387562.html (a Debian developer).
Another journalist even questioned his accuracy and said: “You’d have to wonder why Vaughan-Nichols made what were at times incorrect and at other times naive comments about Debian. Was he playing the troll? Or was he genuinely unaware of the naivety of some of what he wrote?”
http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/11429/1090/
Anyway, I’m sorry, but for me, many of his articles are real turn-offs. They are rants, diatribes, and frankly, very negative and unflattering of the Linux community. They are also often biased or incorrect. His sole concern seems to be the commercialization of Linux and he appears to have no interest in or appreciation of the thousands of volunteers that really make up Linux and the community.
I think he hurts more often than he helps.
SJVN writes some good, well thought out articles. But with others, they come off as anti MS FUD, for which he deserves to be called on.
But I just chuckle when someone complains about anti-MS FUD, when the FUD going the other way is much larger, by orders of magnitude.
When you take into account the MS “Get the facts” campaign, Steve Ballmer’s suggestion of Linux IP violation, the hordes of “Analysts”, who are on MS payroll (either directly or indirectly), who constantly bash Linux, and then all the “Windows Fanboys” who flame against Linux at any opportunity, and the “sue by proxy” (read SCO) by MS, and I can go and and on, the ranting articles by the likes of SJVN are a mere drop in the ocean in comparison.
But I just chuckle when someone complains about anti-MS FUD, when the FUD going the other way is much larger, by orders of magnitude.
I’d say it’s about even, given all of the rumor-mongering, FUD, paranoia, and conspiracy theory that I see being spewed from people that should really know better…
I read the ‘get the facts’ campaign, and I certainly don’t see anything wrong with it; sure, like *any* companies product analysis, there are going to be assumptions based on ‘best case scenario’ but if you were to make a decision involving large amounts of money, you’d look at a number of sources for analysis.
Nice to see you complain about FUD and yet take the interview with Balmer completely out of context as to what the point of the interview.
The interview was relating to software patents; the issue was relatign to patents and how it affects Microsofts software.
He pointed out in the interview that Microsoft does its best to make sure that the software they write do no infringe on others patents, but its not an easy thing to do.
It then goes on to talk about others that might violate Microsoft’s patents, to which Balmer quotes another source, completely unrelated to Microsoft, who said that Linux violated a number of licences. One only assumes that its based on ‘well, Linux does this, Windows does this, so therefore patent violation (compatibility doesn’t necessarily mean violation as there are many ways to implement a given thing).
Interesting how you completely ignore the summery at the end; that is, Balmer stating that this was an *industry* problem that needed to be resolved through a combination of patent reform *and* cross patent licencing – hence the cross patent licencing agreements between Microsoft, Novell, Sun and Samsung.
Interesting, you talk about these ‘analysts’ on Microsofts payroll indirectly or directly, and yet, you ignore the fact that these are disclosed. You also ignore the fact that IBM, Novell, Sun, HP and OSL all either pay for or conduct their own ‘analysis’ of the products they sell.
I certainly don’t attack them when they do it; what I do say, like I say about those conducted by Microsoft – look at all the information that is out there on the given product, both positive and negative.
Who? who flame against Linux? I certainly don’t; I simply point out the reasons why *I* don’t run Linux. For any well adjusted individual, the reasons for me not running Linux shouldn’t impact on their reason for running Linux.
My reason for choosing not to run Linux should require a tonne of replies to posts on my blog completely missing the point of the article let alone failing to read the replies I make to those replies.
I would say the greatest problem I find with Linux ‘zealots’ are their inability to read all the article, read all the replies, and the replies I made, and coming up with a constructive reply that challenges me rather than demanding me copy and paste the same reply I make to others who make the same statements.
And what did SCO pay for? thats right, Microsoft paid for SCO intellectual property (patents and source code) – so I guess since Linux hates code, its all ok to start stealing code off SCO? nice attempt to grab the moral high ground.
Don’t keep your mind so open that your brain falls out.
Don’t keep your mind so open that your brain falls out.
For some, that’s the only path to enlightenment. ;-p
come on, thats funny… why mod him down?
The ones that felt he was talking about them?
Edit: oops, I read that as “who modded him down?”, my subconsciousness probably wanted the joke to fit or something
Edited 2007-04-24 06:52
I have tried Vista on 6 different computers, and the one thing that gets me the most is that sometimes Vista drops keystrokes. If you are typing a document in Word or filling in forms on a web page, or typing in your favourite ssh terminal from vista to your Linux box, there are times when the system is under load, and random characters get dropped. On slower systems it gets really bad, and there are times when I have to hit keys repeatedly for them to “take”. Still trying to figure out why…
Still trying to figure out why…
Try a different keyboard, this happens with oldand/or cheap keyboards
Try a different keyboard, this happens with oldand/or cheap keyboards
He did say this only happened when the system is under load ;-).
That’s a weird one. Seems like interrupts are getting dropped on the floor. What sort of load do you mean? Is the keyboard USB or PS/2? That’s pretty curious.
Given the interrupt priorities, you would only suspect the routines connected to the hardware tick.
Int 0 — system timer
Int 1 — keyboard
Int 2 — connected to another PIC.
Unless this has changed, you seriously have to point to vista on this.
Having said that, responsiveness under load always has bene a problem somehow with different versions.
MS needs to remove the Drm/activation/WGA, lower the price/system requirements, and change the EULA. Many people will be switching to Macs and Linux because of Vista.
Many people will be switching to Macs and Linux because of Vista.
Yeah, all 3 of them with be switching.
“Yeah, all 3 of them with be switching.”
You must mean 3 billion.
You must mean 3 billion.
Who is your dealer? I want some that stuff you’re smoking…
“Who is your dealer? I want some that stuff you’re smoking…”
If you think Vista is wonderful, then you don’t need to smoke anything, you are high enough already.
If you think Vista is wonderful…
Where did I say that? (Hint: I didn’t). I simply suggested that Vista won’t affect migration of people from Windows to Linux/Mac.
“Where did I say that? (Hint: I didn’t). I simply suggested that Vista won’t affect migration of people from Windows to Linux/Mac.”
There will be a steady decline in Windows marketshare. MS will have a very hard time keeping their monopoly with an abomination like Vista.
There will be a steady decline in Windows marketshare. MS will have a very hard time keeping their monopoly with an abomination like Vista.
How can you possibly support such a statement? Vista is the default OS being sold by virtually every PC OEM. As long as that remains the case, Vista will increase in market share. It can’t help but increase.
“How can you possibly support such a statement? Vista is the default OS being sold by virtually every PC OEM. As long as that remains the case, Vista will increase in market share. It can’t help but increase”
Vista marketshare will increase, but overall MS marketshare will decline, because of people switching to Macs and Linux. This is the beginning of the end of a vile monopoly.
Vista marketshare will increase, but overall MS marketshare will decline, because of people switching to Macs and Linux. This is the beginning of the end of a vile monopoly.
That’s an interesting speculation, but there’s no data to back it up. Any change in market share would require quite a few years to come to fruition. If you believe otherwise, you’re kidding yourself. Or you’re smoking something excellllllllllllllllent. ;-p
“Any change in market share would require quite a few years to come to fruition.”
Considering how bad Vista is, Linux just might be gaining marketshare faster than you thought it would.
Considering how bad Vista is, Linux just might be gaining marketshare faster than you thought it would.
Look, I’m not trying to burst your bubble or anything. But it really doesn’t matter whether Vista is considered “good” or “bad” by geeks. It doesn’t matter how much memory or disk space it uses. It doesn’t matter how much CPU the extraneous bloatware processes use. Because consumers don’t think in those terms. All that they care about is whether it looks pretty and allows them to do the few basic things that they want to do with their computers (browsing, email, finances, games, pictures). By that simple test, it passes (seriously, what OS wouldn’t pass such a simple test? But that’s monopoly power for you). And given the fact that Vista will be sold continuously by every OEM with each new machine, it can’t help but dwarf the installs of Linux and Mac. In order to leapfrog Windows, Linux & Mac would need to offer a revolutionary amount of functionality — the kind of functionality that makes it so obvious to consumers that they simply wouldn’t even consider Windows. I don’t see that happening; thus, there’s little reason to expect any kind of change in market share for Linux and Mac. If anything, I expect their desktop market share numbers to decline, not increase.
“there’s little reason to expect any kind of change in market share for Linux and Mac. If anything, I expect their desktop market share numbers to decline, not increase.”
You underestimate people’s disgust for Vista. People hate Vista so much that Dell is selling XP again, and will soon be selling Linux. Linux is getting better everyday, while Windows gets worse. All the people, schools, businesses and governments switching to Linux will put a significant dent in Windows marketshare.
You underestimate people’s disgust for Vista.
Many technorati are not impressed with Vista. But I don’t think that the interest of the average person in operating systems rises anywhere close to “disgust”. People just don’t care that much. Sorry, but I think you’re projecting here.
People hate Vista so much that Dell is selling XP again, and will soon be selling Linux.
Correction: Dell is selling XP on a limited number of models — and only to those customers who specifically request it. Vista will still be the preferred, default OS sold by Dell.
“Dell does not have plans to launch Windows XP for home users as the preference, and demand is for the ‘latest and greatest’ technology, which includes Windows Vista,” Tom West, director of small-business marketing at Dell, said in a blog posting at the time.
http://news.com.com/Dell+brings+back+XP+on+home+systems/2100-1046_3…
Linux is getting better everyday, while Windows gets worse. All the people, schools, businesses and governments switching to Linux will put a significant dent in Windows marketshare.
I think that we’re going to have to agree to disagree here. Sure, some businesses and government agencies may switch to Linux as a cost-saving mechanism; however, consumers will not switch to Linux anytime soon, in my opinion. I’m confident in my opinion, but time will tell.
“People just don’t care that much. Sorry, but I think you’re projecting here.”
Many people don’t care, but I think enough people will care to affect MS marketshare.
“Correction: Dell is selling XP on a limited number of models — and only to those customers who specifically request it. Vista will still be the preferred, default OS sold by Dell.”
If Vista was not so terrible, Dell would not have to offer XP as an option.
“Sure, some businesses and government agencies may switch to Linux as a cost-saving mechanism; however, consumers will not switch to Linux anytime soon, in my opinion. I’m confident in my opinion, but time will tell.”
I think Linux will get a 10% to 20% marketshare increase over the next few years, and the MS monopoly will be broken.
If Vista was not so terrible, Dell would not have to offer XP as an option.
If Vista were “terrible”, as you put it, Dell wouldn’t even offer it. But it’s the default offering. Go figure.
I think Linux will get a 10% to 20% marketshare increase over the next few years, and the MS monopoly will be broken.
Of what market? Server market? Sure, I’ll agree with you on that. But not the desktop market. That’s a pipe dream. Wanna make a bet on that? I could use the cash…
“If Vista were “terrible”, as you put it, Dell wouldn’t even offer it. But it’s the default offering. Go figure.”
Is that Dell’s choice or Microsoft’s?
“Of what market? Server market? Sure, I’ll agree with you on that. But not the desktop market. That’s a pipe dream.”
We shall see!
Lets remember, those companies who have moved to Linux have moved back to Windows; its a nice bargining chip to get a cheaper deal off Microsoft, nothing more, nothing less.
Sun trumpeted a big move by police in the UK moving from Microsoft Office to StarOffice – what are they running now? they’re back to running Microsoft Office under a deeply discounted deal.
I think people need to realise the reality; people use Windows, upgrade their copy of Windows, and keep using Windows simply because of these things:
– Hardware support, whether its supported now, or in the next few months, they know that that their piece of hardware will eventually be supported by Windows Vista.
– Software support, they can run all their favourite applications they like to use. Geneology, stationery and dtp software, point and click photo tweakers like Photoshop Elements.
The worse part is when those who want Linux on the desktop, and used by ‘ordinary people’ deliberately ignore those issues and instead choose to abuse people like me because I happen not to drink the kool aide and tow the party line.
Is this really the case with ALL desktop deployments? It may occur sometimes but certainly not ALL the time. Maybe this is happening in the USA but certainly not here in Europe where some governments and companies convert to FOSS desktops wholesale.
Was this migration really thought through? Lots of custom macros, addins and 3rd party software is often in use that is difficult or costly to replace. Any project that doesn’t consider this is doomed to failure.
And what’s wrong with running necessary Windows applications on Terminal Services or Citrix when they are really critical to the functioning of the organisation?
Where necessary people use Windows either physically or virtually because it’s the best business decision. Where it isn’t required a FOSS desktop could be implemented. It doesn’t have to be all or nothing the systems can coexist.
Who? in very niche-niche situations. I look around in New Zealand, and I don’t see a mass migration; I’m working with Novell trying to get their SLED 10 onto school desktops – currently in negotiations with the Ministry of Education who are very keen to get off the tit that is Microsoft.
I along with Novell and Ministry of Education know the challenges, and I am working closely with Novell to getting those addressed – its up to Novell, however to pull finger and address those issues.
They can sit on the side lines, spitting and cursing at Microsoft or they can listen to customers and fix the areas which make moving from Windows impossible.
If you run the software in a virtual machine, you need to purchase the virtual machine software as well as upgrade all the computers in your organisation with more memory.
Lets say you go down the Citrix/terminal services avenue; that will require upgrading and creating a whole new infrastructure, along with new licences to make that possible; you can’t magically turn a Windows 2003 server into a terminal server without any changes to the hardware, software or licencing.
That’s probably the difference between Anglophone and other countries. When I look around here I see Linux deployed in more places than you would think. In your country they are still talking while here we are doing things.
A retail optician chain here uses KDE desktops. One of the biggest music/games/movies shops here uses Linux desktops. Universities here have dual boot desktops.
I agree that Novell doesn’t do all that it can to accelerate Linux on the desktop. But at least it does a lot more than Red Hat that doesn’t even try. I have found Red Hat and (shudder) Fedora to be unusable on the desktop except for very simple tasks. (K)Ubuntu is a lot more stable and flexible for home users and Novell SLED and even Slackware for business use.
There are low-cost solutions for virtualisation such as VMware Server/Player, Virtualbox and QEMU/KVM (using Virtmanager). RAM is not all that expensive anymore, at least a lot less expensive than purchasing newer computers.
This has probably a lot more to do with the prior investment that was made. Furthermore if you have become dependent upon a Windows infrastructure the barrier to exit is very high which makes a migration more expensive than it would otherwise be.
This has nothing to do with Linux itself. It’s more about standards and lock-in. Something Linux and open source cannot do anything about except make the best out of the situation.
OpenOffice.org can e.g. open most Office documents well enough to be usable. 100% fidelity is only attainable with the plugin from the OpenDocument Foundation. This is not a fault of OpenOffice.org.
As soon as ODF is the standard this kind of problem belongs to the past. A first step in any migration is deployment of open source such as OpenOffice.org, Firefox and Thunderbird on Windows to make a transition to GNU/Linux possible and easier in the future.
Edited 2007-04-24 21:25
Anglophone – interesting. How much of that ‘deployment’ as to do with ‘sticking it to the US’ than actual any real world improvements. Sure, I am a US skeptic, but to simply have reduced productivity for the sake of ‘sticking it to the man’ is wrong sort of motivation tool.
The issue I have isn’t the fact they’re moving; like I said in the past, I want to see more diversity in the OS market; Linux, *BSD, OpenSolaris, and Windows, which will ultimately force the likes of Adobe to adopt platform independent coding styles, languages and frameworks rather than gluing their product to a specific platform.
The issue I have is the fact that people are moving for the wrong reasons; for long term stickability to a platform, the platform needs to be superior, and the motivation to move to the platform has to be because the platform they’ve moved to is better than the platform they’re leaving.
But at the same time, they’ve done some stupid things. Take Mono for example, it was relevant possibly a few years ago, before Java was announced to be opensource, but maybe this would be the best time to port C# and VB.NET to the Java framework so that C# and VB.NET code can be compiled against the Java framework.
What would that result in? a much more mature framework on which C# and VB.NET programmers can write against, and better still, will reduce the cost of maintaining these languages – the cost can be shared amoungst all those who have a vested interest in Java.
That wasn’t meant as attack on countries with English as their primary language. The fact is that the USA, UK, Australia and New Zealand are finding it a lot harder to start using/developing open source applications even on Windows let alone Linux.
Bill Gates was even knighted in the UK for his “achievements”, something that would never ever happen here in sober Holland, where people are a lot less partial to Microsoft “solutions”.
In fact multiple municipalities have migrated to GNU/Linux and OpenOffice.org. In Germany entire state governments are making or have made the switch. We tend to be more concerned about quality and cost and less about platforms.
That Microsoft software is so popular in your country probably has to do with the vast array of native English software available and deployed that has over the years become critical to your organisations. It is probably more convenient to use what’s already available on Windows now regardless of the consequences of that decision in the longer term.
In the Netherlands there are e.g. multiple popular Windows-based accounting packages. But even the most popular one is an unstable patchwork of unreliable VB code that doesn’t do what the accountant wants and is incompatible with itself from version to version.
So he has largely ignored the application over the years and done things his own way. He only uses a small part of the application’s functionality. Now he has contracted me to write a cross-platform solution using OpenOffice.org and Java that does exactly what he wants.
He is already very happy with the preliminary code I have written because it already saves a lot of hassles and time. And because it is based on ODF, OpenOffice.org and Java long term readability of the data is guaranteed.
In other countries in Europe, Asia and South America where English isn’t the primary language and a lot of software hasn’t been translated to the native language the barrier to deploy/write your own software in your native language is a lot lower.
And as for the platform as a matter of fact it is better for their purposes i.e. far higher reliability, stability and security.
I have recently converted an SMB over to a mix of FOSS and Microsoft desktops. The FOSS desktops and servers require very little to no maintenance. We are always afraid that one day the one remaining Windows desktop will die but now it is not fatal anymore.
This action was the only possibility after multiple virus and worm infections made working totally impossible and were very costly in terms of customer satisfaction.
In an instance where Windows software was scattered over multiple desktops I have consolidated it to a virtual server running on top of Linux and connecting to Samba for file-sharing and that is the only Windows machine that has to be maintained anymore.
Backups of the data are rsynced daily and the Windows virtual machine is also backed up regularly. We are thinking of moving all of this over to a real-time high-availability cluster but testing has to done first.
That’s Novell’s problem then. You are free to ignore all Mono development just like I have done. I have never written anything Mono-related and don’t intend to do so anytime soon.
I’d say port all C# and VB.NET code over to Java and drop the Mono platform. There is no reason that programs like Beagle should be beholden to a clone of Microsoft .NET with all its legal ramifications.
If that is too much to ask for make it possible to run that code on the JVM. Mono has largely lost its reason for existence now that Java has gone free and/or open source.
Based on what evidence? in New Zealand, apart from small business, large still use mainframes and UNIX equipment. Same situation with Australia and many other countries. Just because Microsoft has the numbers as in shipments doesn’t mean that their products are actually in positions of importance. If there are moves, they’re merely replacing old and outdated stuff such as SCO, for example.
Oh pulease, name one big name vendor from the Netherlands that has the same impact of Microsoft – love or loath them, Microsof thas had the same large impact that IBM had on the PC.
I can’t name a single EU software or hardware company that has contributed to the IT industry as companies in the US have done – what it seems to me by many here, its nothing more than a grand unified anti-American rant, some how by using Microsoft, they’re allowing ‘American culture’ to infect their country.
Pardon? Where is the Microsoft like company from the Netherlands? how about rather than the EU bashing Microsoft, the EU cut the red tape and provide the sort of environment that would allow a Microsoft sized company to get born.
Even those ‘EU Champions’, I don’t see desktop oriented software coming from them – when are we going to see an EU competitor to Adobe Creative Suite? Microsoft Office? Quicken? MYOB?
As for translation into other languages, the two official languages of New Zealand are English and Maori; the New Zealand government wanted a language kit for Windows which supported the Maori language, Microsoft was more than happy to work with the Maori language think tank with help of tax payers funds.
OK you are probably right about the small business situation. It is pretty much the same here. But still there seems to be more movement here. This is the second year that the tax authorities have launched binaries for Linux x86 and Mac OS X besides those for Windows.
They may have had a possibly positive impact in the earlier phases of the PC but is that still the case now? All I can see now is that it’s stifling the entire ecosystem around their platform.
Is Microsoft progress still synonymous with that of the IT industry? Within a few years even Solaris may be a better desktop OS than anything coming out of Redmond.
And I am not even a Microsoft hater. A few years ago I only programmed using Microsoft technologies but nowadays I write and maintain cross-platform software and am explicitly not excluding Windows.
I tell my customers to run their applications on virtual Windows servers and desktops as long as they need to and possibly forever. That’s because they pay me to give them advice on how to run their systems the way that is most beneficial to them, not to me nor any other company.
Neither am I anti-American or I wouldn’t run a Slackware system using OpenOffice.org (largely developed in Germany), Mozilla Firefox/Thunderbird, Sun Java, VMware Server/Workstation and I am occasionally trying out several of the BSDs and Solaris.
It’s just that I and many of my friends, relatives and customers have been burnt by the shoddy quality and security of Microsoft products that even had some of them on the brink of closing their office.
When I install my complete Slackware based desktop for them I never hear anything from them. The only time they come to me is when their low-quality hardware has failed again.
European companies haven’t had or given themselves a chance to compete against those large American business. In that sense they have rightly failed. This is starting to change now and the EU wants to accelerate this process of giving Europe a second chance at getting an IT industry off the ground.
This will not be possible as long as Microsoft has such a stranglehold on protocols and data formats as it has now. That’s why several countries over here have already adopted ODF as their standard office format.
Mrs. Smit-Kroes (from the Netherlands :-)) is als investigating the market share of Windows Servers in small businesses that has risen from 35% to 75% over the last eight years, which she find unacceptable.
I can attest personally that Windows 2003 SBS precludes or makes it very difficult for other operating systems to operate in the same environment. There is not a single technical reason for this.
She is really not as much anti-Microsoft or anti-American as she is against anti-competitive practices. She has recently fined three major Dutch beer brands that had entered anti-competitive contracts that allowed them to divide the market between themselves at fixed prices.
Germany wants to create a Linux Valley in the region around Muenchen and Nuernberg. I was there three years ago and stores were literally stuffed with SUSE Linux boxes. Not very strange considering Nuernberg is the home of the SUSE Linux development team.
It wasn’t too bad over here either six years ago. Most people download their distributions nowadays or I preinstall it for them with or without virtual Windows.
Does there have to be any? I’d rather think it’s sort of an anomaly that a company that has two basic successful products and many unsuccessful ones has managed to get such a large influence on the IT landscape. Do you really think that happened all by itself without strongarming competitors and vendors?
It is very hard to create software that has the quality and breadth of Adobe products. It will probably take a lot of work and time to build something that can rival the best that Adobe offers today. And I agree that the GIMP doesn’t cut it today and I doubt it ever will.
OpenOffice.org is more or less the equal of Microsoft Office but it still has some rough edges that could probably take some time to polish. The most important problem in migrating is third party addon software that interfaces with Microsoft Office. It’s about time that Sun and Novell start acknowledging this problem and do something about it.
I have to say I don’t know what Quicken and MYOB are and what they do that no FOSS application could do since we don’t use those programs over here. Is it really that hard to replicate the functionality that those applications provide?
I am building an accounting solution for an accountant at the moment. When it reaches a state that it is generally usable we will certainly try to sell it. Most available accounting solutions have had years of development before they reached their current feature set and usability.
I have to say that I am very happy for the people in your country that want to run Windows and/or Office in their native language. But still many people in other countries don’t have that choice today. FOSS at least gives them a chance to have more and/or better native translations than proprietary software.
Vista will cost MS much marketshare, MS is a nasty arrogant monopolist.
Edited 2007-04-24 16:29
“Who is your dealer? I want some that stuff you’re smoking…”
If you think Vista is wonderful, then you don’t need to smoke anything, you are high enough already.
If you think there are better alternative to Windows then dude i don’t really want to be near to what you are smoking…but a friendly advice would be – to stop smokin that shyt man because them things can fcuk u up bad (like SJVN:)).
“If you think there are better alternative to Windows then dude i don’t really want to be near to what you are smoking…but a friendly advice would be – to stop smokin that shyt man because them things can fcuk u up bad (like SJVN:)).”
Have you ever heard of Macs and Linux?
Read my first post again please.
3 billion Windows users? I’d say that’s a hair larger then the 90% market share they are supposed to have.
Who will be switching? Let’s face it unless either Linux gets native Office and Adobe suite (or their open source equivalents improve astronomically) or Apple lets Dell and HP sell OS X boxes, there is nothing that will seriously threaten Microsoft’s dominance on the desktop over next 18 month. And 18 month is plenty of time for MS to sort out any problems there might be.
“Who will be switching?”
People who think they own their computer, not MS.
“Let’s face it unless either Linux gets native Office and Adobe suite (or their open source equivalents improve astronomically)”
OpenOffice and GIMP are good enough for the vast majority of users, for the rest there is CrossOver or Wine.
“Apple lets Dell and HP sell OS X boxes”
Apple will gain marketshare, but they would get much more if they did let Dell and HP sell OS X boxes.
“there is nothing that will seriously threaten Microsoft’s dominance on the desktop over next 18 month”
Vista is the biggest threat to Microsoft’s dominance on the desktop. Abusing customers will send them fleeing to alternative products.
“And 18 month is plenty of time for MS to sort out any problems there might be.”
The Drm/activation/WGA, high prices, bad EULA and absurd system requirements will still be there in 18 months.
OpenOffice and GIMP are good enough for the vast majority of users[i]
I disagre. Gimp doesn’t have the high end features to compete with photoshop and it doesn’t have the ease of use to compete with low end consumer packages. And I’m saying that as a gimp user.
[i]The Drm/activation/WGA, high prices, bad EULA and absurd system requirements will still be there in 18 months.
We’ll see. If there is a genuine revolt against DRM and WGA that threatens their market share, there is nothing stopping microsoft from reworking them in a servicepack. That being said I doubt most people are that bothered by the two as most people here are. As for the system requirement in 18 month they’ll be positivly low end.
Look I love Linux, and don’t like Vista in the slightest. I’m however not letting that stop me from being realistic.
Actually, if more companies jump on EMI’s bandwagon andd start selling DRM free music and Movies, there may not be DRM in Vista in 18 Months.
Vista’s activation is nothing, it neither gets in the way or is restrictive, it is no less annoying then XP’s.
The System requirements are in no way absurd, the same bullsh*t was spouted when XP came out, and Win2k. Vista ran just dandy on my Athlon XP 2800/1G ram, and it runs acceptably on mY 1G Celeron with 756. Even with Aero running. and Firefox, OpenOffice, Gaim and thunderbird all running, it still ran ok.
OK, the prices are high, I’ll give you that.
“Actually, if more companies jump on EMI’s bandwagon andd start selling DRM free music and Movies, there may not be DRM in Vista in 18 Months.”
MS removing DRM from Vista……..not likely.
“Vista’s activation is nothing, it neither gets in the way or is restrictive, it is no less annoying then XP’s.”
Activation does nothing to stop pirates, while annoying paying customers.
“The System requirements are in no way absurd, the same bullsh*t was spouted when XP came out, and Win2k.”
The system requirement increase for XP to Vista is MUCH more than the increase for 98 to XP. Linux is MUCH faster than Vista. Vista is a slow, bloated, drm infected mess, that will give Linux significant marketshare gains. Apple will probably get a marketshare increase also.
It’s obvious from reading this entire topic, that you are unable to discuss this reasonably. You just keep repeating yourself over and over.
MS knows that DRM is bad for business, and just like Apple (who has just as much DRM in OS X and the iPod) has been in talks with the record companies to get rid of it. EMI is the first, MS is in talks with them right now:
http://www.drmwatch.com/ocr/article.php/3669946
http://digg.com/tech_news/EMI_Microsoft_Deal_Coming_Zune_No_3_day_p…
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/tec…
So do some research before you start talking, people may listen to you more.
“MS knows that DRM is bad for business, and just like Apple (who has just as much DRM in OS X and the iPod) has been in talks with the record companies to get rid of it. EMI is the first, MS is in talks with them right now”
If MS knew DRM was bad for business, they would not have infected Vista with it. They are thinking of selling DRM free music because the Apple/EMI deal has forced them to do so. MS is already planning the next DRM OS:
http://www.linuxjournal.com/node/1000176
It would be worse for business to sell an OS that can’t play HD-DVDs and Blue-Ray. An Apple/EMI didn’t force them, everybody but the labels want to get rid DRM, DRM adds needless complexity and inflexibility to the OS.
Vista has no more DRM than OS X and iTunes. I’m not sure where you are getting your info from, but perhaps if you just did some googling, you’d see it is an industry wide problem, and not just MS’s.
“Vista has no more DRM than OS X and iTunes. I’m not sure where you are getting your info from, but perhaps if you just did some googling, you’d see it is an industry wide problem, and not just MS’s.”
Vista has more DRM than any other OS:
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html
I don’t believe that is correct. To be able to play HD-DVDs and blueray, you need to supply a secure playback path. This is the position of the content distributers. I bet you you’ll see a marked increase in the amount of DRM in Leopard, to support HD formats, also, the amount of DRM in itunes is at least as high as mediaplayer, hence the anti-trust suit in the EU
“OpenOffice and GIMP are good enough for the vast majority of users, for the rest there is CrossOver or Wine.”
Your being delusional. I am a fan of Open Source (pats his LAMP box) but to think GIMP is the equal of Photoshop is like saying a Buick is on par with a Rolls. You might wish it was but it just ain’t so. I even like the way OOo handles databases better then Access and how much cleaner Writer is then Word. We get submissions for our site in Word format we open and clean them up in OOo first and then they go to FCKedit. But I don’t think it ready to be a straight up replacement for Office.
And don’t give me “but they are free.” That is what you are competing against. Your competing with free. You have to make them better then free Windows and free Photoshop. Bill G knows this. It isn’t just because he is a nice guy that he is practically giving away Win/Office in China($3 a copy). You may notice lots of requirements to keep people from pirating Windows. Yet you don’t for O2k7. Why? Because you need Windows to run that free copy of Office.
I am not condoning piracy. I am pointing out market facts.
“Your being delusional. I am a fan of Open Source (pats his LAMP box) but to think GIMP is the equal of Photoshop is like saying a Buick is on par with a Rolls.”
I did not say it was equal, I said it was good enough for the vast majority of users. Most people don’t need the extra features that Photoshop offers. They also don’t need MS office, OpenOffice can easily do the job for most people.
“Who will be switching? Let’s face it unless either Linux gets native Office and Adobe suite (or their open source equivalents improve astronomically) or Apple lets Dell and HP sell OS X boxes, there is nothing that will seriously threaten Microsoft’s dominance on the desktop over next 18 month.”
Some groups of people (include tech journalists and Windows advocates) have a psychological need to find Linux lacking.
I love Linux and use it every day. For many things it is by far my favorite platform. However anybody who can’t see that linux is seriously lacking in several areas are just fooling themselves.
>>MS needs to remove the Drm/activation/WGA, lower the price/system requirements, and change the EULA. Many people will be switching to Macs and Linux because of Vista.
> And 18 month is plenty of time for MS to sort out any problems there might be.
Are you implying that in 18 months MS will remove the DRM/Activate/WGA, lower the price/system requirements AND change EULA?
Wow. I wish I could share your optimism.
This was a pretty good article. It was refreshingly different from the previous “I hate Microsoft/Vista” articles that have been posted too often. He provided proof of how SJVN was caught spreading some mistruths and taking it to the extremes. Well thought out and well reasoned, and most of all it was civilized without getting into name calling and other types of flame wars.
This is one job that needs to be off-shored to India along with the CEO’s and sales jobs.
Oh come on now! Thats not very nice!
Stop bitching about India. Your blatant whining and xenophobia is getting rather tired.
xenophobia has nothing to do with it, and someone that assumes that is a complete ass.
It’s about poor training, and horrible customer experience, and generally poor results.
Edit: Ah, I missed the buried comment that started this..
Edited 2007-04-23 21:37
…which I have experienced on numerous occasions from customer support here in the U.S. It doesn’t take a ‘complete ass’ to recognize that these problems are not unique to India (or anywhere else for that matter).
…but don’t let that change your blinkered world view.
So you completely missed my point. Thanks.
“blinkered world view”
Assuming someones motives for complaining are xenophobic is absurd.
When a corporation makes a change SIMPLY TO SAVE MONEY quality often goes down. This has nothing to do with India or it’s people, it’s the corporations shoddy training and focusing only on bottom line. It happens in the US and other nations all the time too.
Again, leave out the race, location, nationality issues and try to see my point.
To assume that a comment made was xenophobic is an extreme personal attack to myself and completely wrong.
If this India comment is about my name, I suppose you’d find it interesting to note that I’m an American-born, American-raised son of an Indian doctor. Sure, my family isn’t totally into all American traditions like Thanksgiving, and Christmas, but I have much more in common with my country than with India, and I’d like to make it a better place on its own merits. What do you want to do for your country?
For an OS that 90% of the world runs it seems likely that there are thousands of people who need serial. Oddball devices, etc. Or even an old modem. Would it kill Vista to support it?
I see what you are saying but then if one has used Vista they probably shouldnt install it on those obsolete old machines anyway!!
I don’t think that you understood what the parent poster meant. Whe he said is that there are thousands of old serial devices out there for which the only way to communicate with it is to write something in C or ASM over serial or RS232 interfaces.
It has nothing to do with the age of the machine, although you do get a point when you say that it will be hard for someone to find a new machine to buy that has such a thing.
Serial is almost critical for embedded development. And with all the chinese and indian developers taken into account I bet the number of serial users runs into the millions!
Serial seems to still be supported. A close reading of that line will show that the new Wacom drivers didn’t support serial… a oversight which was correctable.
Yes!
If this article doesn’t convince him, maybe a mutant midget growing out of someone’s stomach would.
OK, I’ve never thought that I would be defending SJVN, but the author of this article is being even more illogical than SJVN.
One of the major points of SJVN’s article is that Vista isn’t very successful. You on the other hand, would like to prove that SJVN isn’t being objective. And you’re doing so by simply ignoring his data? What’s wrong with you???
Wait, so you’re trying to prove that SJVN isn’t objective using his (alleged) lack of objectivity as one of your premisses? That’s a logical fallacy.
Edited 2007-04-23 21:25
One of the major points of SJVN’s article is that Vista isn’t very successful. You on the other hand, would like to prove that SJVN isn’t being objective. And you’re doing so by simply ignoring his data? What’s wrong with you???
A. It’s too early to evaluate whether Vista is “successful” from a market perspective.
B. Whether or not Vista is “successful” or not is irrelevant to the question of whether Vista is a useful operating system.
Wait, so you’re trying to prove that SJVN isn’t objective using his (alleged) lack of objectivity as one of your premisses? That’s a logical fallacy.
No, bad leap in logic. He’s simply saying that he’s not willing to accept SJVN’s other articles as “proof” for one of SJVN’s current points, based on his lack of credibility.
Well, since you seem to be well acquainted with PlatformAgnostic‘s way of thinking, maybe you could explain to me why this simple explanation for refusal to consider a substantial portion of data presented by SJVN was simply omitted. Refusal to examine a portion of evidence without any substantial justification doesn’t particularly increase the examiner’s own credibility.
Whether or not Vista is “useful” or not is irrelevant to the question of whether Vista is a financially successful operating system. Microsoft had invested a lot of time and money into creating Vista. ROI != usefulness. Also, let’s not forget the main point of SJVN’s argument: since Vista will be a financial failure, Microsoft should just open-source it. Now, personally, I think it’s a seriously flawed idea. However, I also happen to think that PlatformAgnostic‘s “rebuttal” is equally flawed.
Yes, the very same credibility his argument sets out to dispute. That’s circular logic. You cannot cite your conclusion as one of your premisses. No amount of semantic wiggling can change that.
I was attempting to dispute SJVN’s sources, since I don’t particularly trust his assertions and wanted to see the data behind them. I’m a student, and I wrote this article to take a break from one of my most stressful weeks ever. I’m not paid to do this, so I’m not going to spend my time chasing down every reference in SJVN’s web.
I just wanted to point out that there was a bit of a ZDNet echo chamber. SJVN echoing himself is not that interesting to me. If you have a point to make about any SJVN fact I missed, please post it here so that it may be discussed. I’d like to keep the scope technical, though… I won’t respond to points about marketshare or licensing practices. DRM is fair game, but only the technical aspects of it.
I don’t object to your examination of facts presented by SJVN. I am merely pointing out the fact one of your premisses and the conclusion you’re trying to reach, are the same, which constitutes a logical fallacy. Your argument is fundamentally flawed. Now, this has nothing to do with whether SJVN is being objective or not (personally, I think he and objectivity weren’t exactly introduced to one another). I don’t have a problem with your premisses or your conclusion. It’s your logic I have a bone to pick with; it’s simply flawed.
“SJVN is a biased troll” was my premise, not my conclusion. I’ll freely admit that what I wrote was a rant, but I’d like you not to think it’s a screed. I tried hard to present details which might be interesting to an OS enthusiast.
Really, the whole point of my article is the plea in my blurb at the end. I want to learn more about the internals of Linux and other OSes that people are experienced with. I think it would be fun and worthwhile to start a OSAlert Enlightenment project so that we can defend our chosen OSes with facts and experiments rather than quotemining and citing biased sources like ZDNet.
I think you’d do best to start investigating things such as noexec mount support, suauth authentication, SELinux/Grsecurity/Apparmor for Linux and Zones, Trusted Extensions and Process Access Rights for Solaris.
These come by default with modern Unix/Linux OSes and are sadly lacking even in the newest Windows version. They must not be a priority or too difficult to be made to fit the current NT system design.
Also it could very well be that NT might be safe at the kernel level. It is certainly not at the user level and that is what most complaints from Unix/Linux users are about.
They ask for a replacement for Win32 that is securely coded from scratch without any transfer of older code. If Microsoft manages to pull this off a lot of the complaints about Windows’ security would be gone.
The fact that Apple has managed to do this and Microsoft hasn’t puts the latter at a huge disadvantage that will take them a long time or forever to overcome.
NT based operating systems were supposed to be as good as or better than OpenVMS in stability, reliability and security just like Linux is compared to Unix. I really can’t see how this could possibly be the case. Enlighten me if you know any better.
Edited 2007-04-24 13:22
fanboy fights again.. this is like watching celebrity deathmatch. We all are entitled to our opinions and the author made SOME good points regarding published comments and aarticles regarding Vista. BUT the author also made a few negative ones that make him come across as a gun for hire by Microsoft (in parts at least).
Now what REALLY is interesting about MS is the licensing.. and that’s what killed my mood today after a meeting with them… I plan to write an article within the next few days about this because whoever said that a TCO of a Windows infrastructure was much cheaper then anything else, wasn’t just smoking crack, they were smoking anything they found.
I am appalled by the cost that they squeeze from the enterprise and because of the auditing and licensing etc. you have to buy them.. Oh and if you think that buying a copy of Vista for your clients is enough to access Windows Servers, think again.. the OS is NOT considered under CALs generally…
Anyway, this was totally off topic. My bad. about the article, well it looks like someone didn’t like what SJVN had to say and thought it would be good to publish something against it.
Nothing spectacular here except maybe trying to start another flamewar…
//vic
blog.2blocksaway.com
Despite what PlantformAgnostic wants everyone to believe. Microsoft is truly at fault for not creating a secure foundation for Windows to be built on and going up from there. Instead Microsoft tries to fix it at the top and work it’s way down and that just doesn’t work.
You may not like the way that UNIX handles security but the things is, UNIX security works a lot better than Windows security. The main reason why UNIX doesn’t sell millions of copies for desktop computers is mostly the elitism of UNIX core OS programmers and the CEOs that artificially keep the price high.
Despite what Microsoft fanboys want to admit. It is not through obscurity that UNIX, including Linux and Mac OS X, is far more secure than Windows is.
As PlantformAgnostic said, security isn’t easy. But it is a cop out to not hold their feet to the fire to create something better. How many people work at Microsoft? Easily over 40,000 people. You would think someone there knew how to build a lot more secure kernel.
Would it break backwards compatibility? Yes. But that’s what emulators are for. Apple had the Classic Box so it can be done. And Mac OS X is far more secure than OS 9 and before. Again. It can be done.
Where there is a will there is a way. It’s just that someone near the top has to will it. If they won’t or can’t it won’t be done. So far we can see there isn’t much of a will.
Edited 2007-04-23 22:16
Yeah, just about what I was going to say, plus:
“I hope to show that these bugs are rather complicated issues that are inevitable in any large software project. They have nothing in particular to do with Vista’s design and everything to do with its sheer size.” (from the article)
Putting all the backwards compatibility warts and other stuff in there is a design decision!
Maybe they’ve done their best to limit the ramifications of this decision but they still made it.
I do hope they soon come to the point where they question this decision because – as Vista’s delayed release has shown – this way of development is no longer sustainable.
I mean, they really got the money to hire the best programmers out there if they’re not already working for MS.
Imagine what they could achieve if they made a fresh start and stopped supporting ancient bugs just to keep the buggy apps running…
As other people have said before, the right time for this step will probably be when most applications use .NET.
Where’s the kernel insecurity? The security problems with the NT line of Windows has most often been in the defaults rather than in the mechanisms. Running everyone as admin is convenient from the usability point of view, but not great for security. When used, the Windows ACL mechanism and security design works quite well.
We’re going through the painful time now of fixing that. But your overall characterization of me is fairly accurate. I really am not a high-security person and don’t truly believe in protecting my computer from actions I willingly engage in. I avoid crappy programs that do things in my name that I do not wish done, and that’s all the security I desire for myself. I understand that there needs to be a separation between administrator and luser in most other scenarios.
Could you explain why you’re misspelling my nick? I find that to detract from your argument.
About usability and security…
Does it by now have an option to make File Streams / Alternate Data Streams visible in Explorer? Without having to resort to crude ways like enabling file auditing and viewing them in some log or opening the CLI? I mean, this is an essential feature, there since almost eons. Can i access this feature easily with the most visible tools? Can i?
Edited 2007-04-23 23:20
What’s your fear with alternate data streams? I may be wrong, but I don’t think the OS loader takes executable code from there, so viruses can hide out, but won’t be automatically executed from an ADS on most user actions.
If you’re worried about people violating quotas or performing DOS with ADSes, I can see what you’re saying. This is an interesting attack, and I’m not sure what the answer to it is. On the other hand, I don’t see how any malicious hacker can make money off of doing this, so the threat isn’t too bad.
For me it is a thing of percieved security and therefore usability. I know there are other ways to hide something. But my perception is that i have an integral part of the filesystem which is not easily accessible to me. Since almost anything is about files, this irks me in a way which is equal to its integration in the lowest layers of NTFS.
Now playing: It’s just an Illusion…
You have a very good point that I think I understand now. Would it be good enough to have a list of alternate data streams in the file-properties within the explorer right-click menu?
Yeah, that would be good. Why, does it exist? Did i oversee it at work? (Not that i’d use it in private anyways)
No, it doesn’t exist yet. Right now you have to go through the CLI. I might write a program that integrates with the shell and does this if/when I get a bit of spare time.
You mean something like ntfsext.exe from there
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dn…
?
This might be the first productive OSAlert thread that had anything to do with an operating system…
I didn’t purposely misspell your nick. My fault. I typed it once then copied it without realizing I had misspelled it.
Security problems are actually with both but more with the latter. Despite what they will tell you there is still a lot of security work to be done. They won’t truly get really far though until they build a secure OS from the ground up.
Just like a parent that is supposed to set limits and protect their children. OS venders need to make sure to put in limits of what general users can do to themselves.
Too many people I support at work do not realize that what they do can cause someone to gain rights to their financial data on their computer. It’s not that they are stupid but they assume that Microsoft would leave them vulnerable. I have to explain to them that MS does by making it too easy to say yes to hazardous websites, downloads, and attachments in e-mails.
To protect them we have several servers that constantly check all of these things, causing a slight delay in the user’s access of all of them, and blocking things that are questionable. We even block zip files or any kind of file that can’t be easily scanned. A message is put in their e-mail stating the attachment has been blocked and why. Same with websites.
We shouldn’t have to go to this expense. The security should be built in the desktop OS to begin with.
Edited 2007-04-24 00:05
NT is a reasonably secure OS. Starting from scratch at this point really helps no one. You lose compatibility and have to go through the iterative security testing process all over again. Even the “secure-from-the-ground-up” UNIX had to go through the trial by fire until it has reached its current status as a secure OS.
At work, could you use “Software Restriction Policies” to only allow the people you support to run supported applications? If they can’t execute anything that they don’t need for their job, then you wouldn’t have to worry so much about them getting taken over by questionable stuff.
Link here:
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/prodtech/windowsxp/secwin…
“NT is a reasonably secure OS. Starting from scratch at this point really helps no one. You lose compatibility and have to go through the iterative security testing process all over again. Even the “secure-from-the-ground-up” UNIX had to go through the trial by fire until it has reached its current status as a secure OS.”
Reasonbly is not good enough. You gain compatibility by having a box that old programs run in like using VMWARE to run the old OS inside the new one, each protected from each other. That’s how you do it. XP has had plenty of time (if Microsoft cared) to secure their OS if they could. The foundation is cracked (think of cement with cracks) though so they can’t.
“At work, could you use “Software Restriction Policies” to only allow the people you support to run supported applications? If they can’t execute anything that they don’t need for their job, then you wouldn’t have to worry so much about them getting taken over by questionable stuff.”
We do have those policies in place. But when have you ever seen those policies stop someone from going to a bad website. No one knows about ALL of them and while we do our best to detect SPAM and possibly bad links for them, some will always get through. So will the occasional e-mailed document that has a virus that the AV software didn’t catch. Not to mention the documents/viruses brought in on USB memory cards. We of course run AV software on the desktop and update each night there is an update. But again, show me the tests that show that any AV software catches 100% of viruses.
Software Restriction Policies are not some verbal thing. They’re a feature of the OS. If you set it to “Default Deny” then the OS won’t LET them run anything from those bad websites. There is some administrative overhead to this, because they can’t install something they need without administrator approval.
Your users run as Limited Users anyway, though, right? If not, then nothing I’m saying applies and no OS can guarantee you security under those circumstances.
You may not have heard yet but that doesn’t stop everything. Look at the article about naming programs helps determine which apps you need admin rights to install programs. There is a way to name them to where it doesn’t ask for or require admin rights.
The next point is home computers. We don’t have (and don’t want) organizational control over home users computer. This is where they are their most vulnerable and dependent on MS doing a good job of security.
Much much better than the typical original content on osnews.
The author deserves credit for going through the trouble of debating the actual “points” that SJVN made.
Nice try at raising the level of the debate (even though I think it will fall on deaf ears at this site.)
Despite the fact that Microsoft has indeed lots of very talented and capable people at hand, why is it that the general perception of the people in the ICT who tend to be informed enough about such matters see Vista as evil and too bloated? One could say, O.K. this is the 21st century, size doesn’t matter that much anymore. But one could also see this as a point of no return, where the further way is destined to be software archeology like in Vernor Vinges A Fire Upon the Deep. Towards a singularity where no escape is possible. I for that matter won’t even touch it with a long pole. It’s just no viable option. Despite all that glitz and glitter. Go on, do a dance around the emperors new clothes. I won’t be there to enjoy it
It’s not that my life depends on what software MS produces, is it? I may choose to evaluate Vista and decide FOR MYSELF if I like it/suites my needs/etc. I see OS-es as they are: TOOLS and in that regard, I won’t use a hammer or dump whatever hammer I’m currently using, for example, just because some X(tm) hammer zealot/basher keeps throwing at me reasons to switch or dump that hammer. In the end, everyone is able to decide for himself what OS to use, so, why all this never ending fuss? I got tired of this BS.
I understand fighting for and promoting something YOU did, I find endless bashing or praising other’s work a waste of time.
* currently using feisty, not because it’s the best operating system ever, windows killer, the solution to the BUG (https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux-source-2.6.20/+bug/1), but because I’m comfy with it at the moment and I see no reasons to spend the amount of money MS is charging for Vista at the moment, I have better use for them.
Don’t believe my stories on Vista security? Fine, here’s what you do. Go to Google. Do a search on Vista security. Ignore everything by me or from Microsoft.
Start reading.
Enjoy.
Steven
I’m sorry, but Google’s a bit too wide of a scattershot. Many of the top hits (top 20) are either by Microsoft or by technology press and there is no overwhelming trend in there. The ones that point out flaws in the security model are sourced from people with Antivirus software to sell.
There’s a link to Peter Gutmann’s article in there, but that’s not really a security thing… it’s DRM. There’s also a link to Joanna Rutkowska’s article about the flaws in the integrity level system. This is an interesting topic, but not one which you discussed… we could talk about this.
Would you like to discuss something in particular? Not something vague, like “MS should rewrite their whole OS because of bugs from 14 years ago,” but a flawed security design that is affecting people you work with or talk to today.
I don’t agree with all of author’s arguments but I agree with his conclusion: SJVN is too biased, to the point I’m not reading those rants anymore (which is unusual for me, because I use to read about Linux, though I’m not using it. I also read about Solaris, xBSD and sometimes about little OS projects too. I use to like to read people’s opinions though I’m still happy with my Vista choise.).
There’s a big difference in saying “I prefer Linux” and “Everything Microsoft does is just 100% awful because it is…”.
Unfortunately, that’s how you end up when you start believing that Windows is popular because of marketing. Instead of asking “Why Linux community is not able to make good desktop applications, except thousands of instant messengers… thousands of little utilities etc. ?”, which would be the point, you start believing that Microsoft evil marketing machine is covering users’ eyes.
And then, of course, if you behave like that you just start to spread myths. So you just repeat that “Linux is inherently more secure than Windows no matter what” and you don’t wonder why Linux was most hacked OS during 2005 (according to UK Gov Security agency… an article I think I found here on OSAlert… if I recall it right).
Oh, and what about 0 vulnerabilities in IIS 6 or SQL 2005? Hmmm… didn’t read SJVN writing about these good results nor comparing them to nasty (according to what I read) Apache 2 critical bug.
That’s exactly what being biased is: bugs for your most hated OS get so important they could lead to end of planet Earth life… bugs for your preferred OS are.. well… just bugs.
Index finger waggling!
1st: Vista for now is meant for desktop use. So no comparisons between that and Apache, please.
2nd: There is no Linux as such. There are individual distributions from different vendors or groups which bundle the kernel at different patch levels and different drivers, with different administration tools and defaults for core components and packet repositories and services and bundle that with different applications. It’s up to you to choose from them according to your needs, including different security subsystems which sometimes can eliminate the exploitability of said bugs in different ways.
3rd: “Good” in desktop applications is a matter of taste besides of their capabilities. Here also it is up to you to choose from them, there is more than countless incarnations of instant messengers.
4th: can you spell difference and choice?
Edited 2007-04-24 00:10
Plonk me in that catagory. I love reading about the interesting things that are occuring in other operating systems and software – whether or not I use them. It would be nice for people to just be happy with what they have rather than feeling the need to push their choices onto others, and bash those who happen to run a particular operating system which isn’t the same as their own.
“MSFT may not be as nimble as Apple or as well-regarded as Google, but they still have large cadres of talented engineers.”
The rest of the article sounds … na"ive to me. Sorry, but Vista is in many regards a big disappointment, first of all for Microsoft. It’s ok to address false claims about Vista, but the overall tone of this article just doesn’t reflect how Vista is, either.
What lets me down most is how many good things Microsoft could do in its position, but seems to even fail to think about. Microsoft would have had enough power and breath to get rid of all of its relics, and to propagate new ways of computer usage.
Instead, they use all the time to release just another crappy instance of the same old system (I’m not talking about code here, but about overall design). Fine, they have new user-space audio with the side-effect of impossible hardware-acceleration on it. But how much help is this, when on the other side file system folders have to be faked to keep the system running?!
Edited 2007-04-23 23:47
Start laying down the Astroturf. IMHO Vista is a buggy indefensible DRM platform.
MS is willfully trying to Kill OpenGL to propel Directx10 so that fewer applications are cross-platform.
This stuff is pretty obvious to you, but could you enlighten the rest of us a bit about what you mean?
There is DRM in Vista, but there is also some DRM in XP. The DRM does not affect files that are not already DRMed and none of the encryption systems are running when your machine is not playing DRMed files. So yeah, it’s a DRM platform. But it’s also a platform for non-DRMed stuff and that’s what most of the world will use it for.
OpenGL is not dead in any real way. The GPU vendors have always included an OpenGL implementation with their drivers. Microsoft has long included an OpenGL wrapper around DirectX for situations in which the GPU vendor fails to provide one. The situation hasn’t changed. OpenGL still works on Vista, just like on XP.
Read here for more info: http://www.opengl.org/pipeline/article/vol003_9/
The sacrifices for DRM in vista are much higher than in XP. If only MS cared about the users security as much.
OpenGL? Funny, it seems that everyone says that it’s broken in a big was in vista. In addition, most gamers have found everything in vista graphic-wise buggy and crashy. With this trend, Wine will run MS Windows applications better Linux than Vista does.
It was nice of MS to encourage everyone, and I do mean everyone, to try alternative platforms.
Man, that was a serious load. Most of the Gamers I talk to that have Vista like it for the most part. They have noticed slight differences in speed, but most people still have DirectX 9.0 cards. As far as OpenGl goes, I haven’t had too many problems, I don’t play many games on my PC, but it handles Celestia and other GL apps just fine, but that is just my own experience.
Edited 2007-04-24 16:42
Most of the gamers are complaining now, but like Windows XP, you’ll see them praise it like mana from heaven. Windows Vista SP1 will be released in the second half of this year, along with DirectX 10, add to that new games coming not too longer after that.
Add to that the maturity of graphics drivers would have increased; given the complexity of WDDM and what it demands of graphics card driver writers, there will be teathing problems.
I agree, it’s just like OS X 10.0 when it came out. It wasn’t near finished, but now it is a seriously wicked OS. XP was the same, and so is Vista
I remember MacOS X when it first came out, it was horrid – and thats putting it mild; for most, it didn’t start to become useful until 10.2.8/10.3.x, and an acceptable operating system to use until the later 10.3.x releases and 10.4.x.
Personally, having been in the MacOS X position before, I can assure you of one thing; Windows Vista was no where as bad as MacOS X in the early years; Windows Vista problems are related to a lack of drivers and shoddy third party software vendors (like Adobe) refusing to issue updates to solve compatibility issues
Infact, most of these companies have seen these incompability issues as a call to stop supporting their old product in favour of charging people for a minor revision upgrade for compatibility.
That “slight difference in speed” is Vista’s increased DRM overhead.
It’s not only games that are affected, it’s 3D design aps like Rhino3D’s:
http://en.wiki.mcneel.com/default.aspx/McNeel/RhinoOnVista.html?dif…
OpenGL is not working well for Stellarium:
http://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.php?thread_id=1672207&forum_id=2…
And it seems that not overthing is rosy for Celestia users:
http://www.shatters.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10919&sid=c5f5f38151a…
Geez. Read your own links. There are fixes for the mcneel case (they suggest getting a plugin from their site to use directX… perhaps installing the latest ATI/NVidia drivers helps to fix the problem too).
For the next two links, the problems are resolved by installing the latest drivers from Intel, ATI, or NVidia.
DRM has nothing to do with this because none of these applications invoke any of the DRM mechanisms. As is always the case in any OS, if you’re not using something, it only takes HD space.
Can you give me something honest here?
8: Some problems he reported through Windows Diagnostics haven’t been solved yet? Boo hoo! Wait a few months and check back. It’s better than before, when there was no solution most of the time and no one ever knew there was a problem. FWIW, most of my problem reports offer reasonable advice (if the driver is missing, it tells me to check the manufacturer’s site… if a major program is crashing it gives a link to the latest version or to a KB article).
Thank you for the Vista tip above. It’s so useful that I thought it was a Linux tip.
Vista-advocate smacking a non-Vista advocate ? From where does this urge to defend Vista and its engineers ? Like it would matter. Like we would care. It’s not the love stories of Vista-believers that will make us use Vista, it’s the need (work), it’s the curiosity (try/buy), it’s the inevitable (preload), it’s the demand (kids: pa’ I want Vista). Some guys coming singing odes of it won’t do much. Not with me, at least.
Other than that what the frack is this
? So what, we should get the point ? Or we should be ashamed and hide ? Perish in anguish ? Change religions ? Throw out our laptops and workstations and servers ? Bash and step on every head that has a Linux partition ?
Yeah, I thought so. Then whadda freaking stupidity makes one insert such a line when he’s a Vista man talking about Vista to someone who was also talking about Vista ? Man, get a beer and go write fairytales.
No… please tell me about the strong areas of linux. Please try to be an OS Enthusiast rather than a Windows Hater. That’s why I was looking in particular at Linux advocates.
I’m now feeling a little sorry I included that little dig against Linux advocates. It really detracts from my main point.
First, the writing was about Vista vs Vista really. Encouraging people to add pro-Linux lines would make it end in fire. Not much use. Other than that, people got just too much used to react to “strong areas of Linux” stories as tales from people who no nothing about the strengths of Windows, thus also resulting in fire.
My point ? Everybody should just stick to their point and try to make valid arguments without doing collateral damage.
Anyway, I mean no offence, but these Vista vs Vista argumentations just don’t matter to many of us (not even to me developing on Windows sixteen hours a day). To average users maybe, and I can see the possibilty of gaining traffic and site visits and buzz of responses from such writings, and I don’t have anything against it in general (well, I’ve also managed to obtain financial profits from some Linux writings at some point so why should I have anything against anyone trying to do the same).
Without the Linux poking I probably wouldn’t have reacted, so yes, I can confirm that even such lines can help in raising attention.
Other than that, being a Linux advocate is not a thing to dismiss or despise. What I take as being offensive is thinking of them as ignorant folks who don’t know any better (writer’s note: the word “better” is not used here to mean that other OSes would be better
).
Most Linux advocates I know use Windows. It’s often one of the reasons they become Linux advocates.
I find it funny how with one breath there is outrage that MS hasn’t completely rewritten Windows, yet in the next there is outrage at how compatibility has been broken. Or how people look at a screenshot and decide that the only thing Vista provides is a slightly updated GUI, and then complain that they have to relearn where things are. Microsoft has a history of looking at things long term, and Vista is only a stepping stone. They have admitted that they had to scrap development and start over two years ago, thus not everything they previewed was able to make the cut.
Vista is a big move forward in moving code into the user space and out of the kernel. And yes drivers have to be rewritten to do that, which is up to the vendors not Microsoft. Knowing this, the beta programs were vastly opened up, and communication was more than ever before. The vendors have had access to the code for more than a year now. Why haven’t their development efforts been better?
Look just at just the video drivers. They may currently have glitches in some games but so did the XP video drivers when that first came out. But you know what? Now with the new driver model, when my video driver freaks out, as they all do at some point, my box no longer blue screens. The screen goes black for a second and then it comes back, with a little popup telling me that it had an issue and restarted the driver, and my game goes right on playing.
As soon as it was announce that the networking stack was being rewritten for the first time since 95, they were immediately criticized that it was now insecure as the old stack had already been attacked and patched. Never mind that the previous model assumed that all links were modem speeds, and that its very architecture had security issues, and that it’s IPv6 support was wrapped around the v4 stack.
Mac might be able to scrap their previous os on a dime, but when they did that their user base was what 5%, if that. Microsoft has roughly 20 times the users to consider. There are apps written for Dos 6 that still run, and if they don’t there will be hell to pay. But if you think that they aren’t working on rewrite you are very mistaken. They have already done previews of Singularity, which is their research project on a fully managed code kernel. They are investing heavily in virtualization, not only of the os but of individual apps with their acquisition of Softricity. The rumors are that the next os will have the new UI, will only run natively run .net code, and will break compatibility; I would imaging using virtualization to provide compatibility instead of maintaining legacy code in the OS.
Vista does also have things I don’t like, mostly UI quirks, and I have a few issues with the way UAC was implemented, in regards to not integrating the other legacy prompts so i have to click three times on some things to authorize them. But I think that it was an important step forward. I have also used other operating systems, in fact I’ll try most anything at least once. I am continuously impressed by the unique ideas that pop up in the Linux world. OSX has great consistency within their UI and some great ideas in usable UI. And I think BE was ahead of its time with the underlying operating architecture.
It’s too early to say whether Vista will be financially successful. In fact I’m sure it will not sell as many in the long term as XP given that they have already said that it will not run as long between the next update. It will, however, be the first step in forcing applications to be designed with security in mind. No longer can developers assume they are running as administrator. No longer can they modify the kernel at will. Instead of plowing over the os when it is convenient applications will be forced to work with it. And as was mentioned, bugs are inevitable not only in Microsoft’s code but in the third party code that runs on top of it. But the OS is now not only capable of identifying, notifying and patching these bugs, but can make best efforts to mitigate the damage they are allowed to cause. This can only result in a better experience in the long run.
Thank you to the author for a well written article.
last week a friend of mine stopped by and needed help with her new laptop that, you knew it, came with vista preinstalled. she nedded some advise on how to install some software she pretty much needs.
so i had the chance to see vista in action and use it for a day.
some parts of the UI i have to say, are pretty well designed, not in a usable way, but in the aspect of shinyness and design. good work!
but then – how do i put it and to not sound like a linux fanboy? – the sheer ignorance of the user was driving me crazy! in the ways of user interaction, they got it completely wrong.
if gnome is ‘users are idiots’, then vista is ‘users are retarded’.
rightclicking a .zip and choosing winrars contextmenues for extracting resultetd in nothing. nothing happend at all.
doublecklicking a .zip opend winrar, but then the screen went grey and a window popped up asking me that some strange things were going on and if i really wanted do what i wanted do. sure, continue.
after extracting the .zip the same dialogue popped up, this time asking me if my installation (wtf?) went ok or not. this went on for nearly every interaction i had with vista.
sure, after that, i was as ignorant of vista as vista was ignorant of me, but how can someone call this userfriendly? i could have poked around and surely find a way to let winrar do its job the way it should, but i had to deal with installing some design software which in the end failed.
i know this is not a well researched comment. on the other hand, i interact with computers for more than 15 years, but it was also 15 years ago since i felt that helpless.
This rebuttal doesn’t really deny the existence of those problems, it just basically say that they are not big deal.
However, what it still doesn’t explain: why would anyone want to buy vista? Certainly not to have some new problems even if they are not that serious.
Also, I usually expect contributed articles to have higher quality than a message board post.
So… if I’m candidly surfing the web, it’s just a bug (not a design flaw) that my computer can be completely taken away from me in the most hyped-secure (not hyper-secure) OS ever? Come ooooon! Web browsing should be MILES away from candid “taking over by a cracker”…. I think it’s a design flaw.
If you didn’t run your computer as admin, the odds are it couldn’t be taken over by this “cracker”
That’s right…. it shouldn’t be able to take over your account by just surfing the web… but as it is a design flaw you can give away your computer that easily:
http://www.determina.com/security.research/vulnerabilities/ani-head…
http://www.us-cert.gov/cas/alerts/SA07-089A.html
Oh… and by the way, determina sais they have bypassed the patch by microsoft…. and it took months to microsoft to develop the patch. That’s the way to go!!! Life is definitely beautiful these days.
It’s not a “Design flaw” the ability to use the computer as a normal user is built in to Windows, it’s a bad default choice.
I would really like to take the time to point some things out.
1) Hardware Requirements
Every OS that is doing graphics card compositing needs lots of ram. If you are telling me you can run the latest gnome with beryl on 256, you are insane. Sure, you can run linux on a toaster, but you will be using a stripped down command line to do it. The more the OS does, the more resources it takes.
As for the people who say it should require less then XP, while doing significantly more then it already does, that is even more ludicrous.
2) DRM
For the love of god, noone is forcing you to run DRM content. HD-DVD and Blu-Ray *just* came out, it will take another year or two for them to become standard, and then where will linux be? Linux able to even run the current standard media (DVD) legally, how is not being able to run what will soon be the standard a bonus? And if you think apple will never support HD-DVD, think again. DRM is a reality, and having the choice of being able to access media you legally purchased is a feature.
3) Features
I have seen so many people now say that vista doesnt have any significant features over XP besides the eye candy. So lets take a moment to go over a few that I personally appreciate.
-Self optimizing/diagnosing system.
This is the first OS I have ever heard of that optimizes itself for what you use the most (when I launch VS or PS, they leap to the screen almost as fast as notepad), and will tell you when there is a problem and why (the other day it let me know there was a registry problem and how to fix it).
-Well done networking support
I alwas thought it was kind of pathetic that it was easier to connect PCs together using SMB with linux and mac then it was with windows to windows. The new networking control center is easy, intuitive, and a joy to use. Not only that, vista is the first os I have used that will optimize its network settings to give you the best performance to whatever you are connecting to.
-Security
The travesty that was XP seems to have given MS a complex, because Vista is (if anything) too locked down. They have implemented a security paradigm similar to Ubuntu and OSX, which is lock everything down completely except for what is owned by the user, and only escalate priviledges when required. Add on the fully functional built in firewall, absolutley paranoid IE7, DEP, and windows defender which alerts you to things like registry and startup changes, and you get something that can no longer be called insecure. OSX is the only one that does this properly for a desktop environment, but at this point, the vista security paradigm is totally on par with linux.
-Completely redone multimedia
Sound, graphics, video, and desktop rendoring are completely and totally redone. The desktop effects are significantly nicer then osx, video plays with less resources and better quality, and there is frameworks there for next-gen sound drivers which should have significantly less latency. In a year or two, windows should once again be competing with osx in terms of media creation. In this field, linux is years behind.
Vista is far from revolutionary (osx is the revolutionary one), but compared to previous versions of windows, this is the first one I have not dispised. I have heard reports of bad performance and all sorts of hardware problems, none of which i have experienced. I have heard of activation issues, which i havent experienced either, as I have an HP. Everything runs smoothly, and it is an absolute joy to use. Considering all the stuff that was changed, It is suprising it is as good as it is. Look at osx.0, it was barely usable. Now, it is the best desktop os by a long shot.
Great comments.
I actually like XP. I had to do some testing the other day on a Vista image where I work. I was annoyed in the first 5 minutes.
I read the first page and it’s obviously a waste of time to read any further.
The entire article could be boiled down to three sentences:
1) I hate SJVN.
2) Vista will get better – someday.
3) Windows is better now than it was in 2002.
We needed three pages of nonsense to establish that the author is a Windows shill?
Listen up, fanboy. Vista sucks. It’s not selling. Microsoft shot itself in the foot – as was predicted by virtually everybody beside Windows fanboys.
Deal with it.
I’m trying to raise the tone of discussion by addressing real issues using easily testable facts or reasonable assertions which I support with argument.
What are you trying to do, richardstevenhack? I think your comment is offensive and contains personal insults. Are you sure YOU are “dealing with it”?
Right or wrong SJVN is seldom ignored by audience. Like him or not many people read his articles, and talk about them.
I am a big Linux fan myself but I use Windows XP/2003 95% of the time because of work (I’m a programmer and network administrator for a port management company). I’ve come a long way in terms of Windows (from Win3.11 WFWG) ’til Windows Vista, so I guess my views aren’t that biased against Windows.
When Windows Vista came out (for enterprise users, way back November 2006), our company decided to explore the possibility of migrating about 100+ desktops to Vista by 2007 or 2008. So the company asked our unit to check out Vista (through an evaluation kit from our vendor for 6 PCs). We have been using Vista from Nov ’06 till Mar ’07 and guess what. We had to switch back to Windows XP.
You don’t need rocket science to figure it out. Problems with drivers (initially with Nvidia but that got fixed), serial drivers (yeah, we NEED serial drivers), incompatibilities with MICROSOFT SOFTWARE (initially with ISA server client but that got fixed anyway, and with Visual Studio). We were initially patient with the problems but when we hit the incompatibilities with MICROSOFT SOFTWARE, we decided to ditch Vista. Security? You mean UAC prompts? Silly.
Vista is not yet ready for the enterprise. Thats for sure. At least in my experience and 5 other co-workers. Maybe not until next year or until they release SP1 or SP2. I love the UI though and the search capabilities but other than that, there were no features to compell me to switch from XP. Neeraj was correct when he said “Check back after a couple of months…”. It’s the same Microsoft of old. Release buggy software then fix with a service pack. Enterprises (and home users) don’t need 7GB (yes! 7GB+ of basic install!) of buggy software masked with a beautiful eye-candy.
Bottomline: SJVN was right. Vista has problems. Don’t take our word for it though. Try it for yourself. Hopefully, your experience with Vista won’t be as bad as ours.