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Here in the world of technology, there's no denying that developers of even the most creative new products and ideas "stand on the shoulders of giants," just as innovators in most other realms do too. New ideas inspire more new ideas over time, after all, so it's not surprising to see myriad commonalities and linkages among them. Lately, however, that notion is being examined a little more closely than usual in light of recent revelations about Microsoft's forthcoming Windows 8 and -- in particular -- how much it has in common with Linux.
so can we get a Linux company to sell Microsoft a license for their own Windows 8, because surely MS must be using a Linux patented method in there some where. This would be the ultimate irony.
I have been following these LinuxGirl articles for some time, and enjoy the info and different views, but hairyfeet's comments really irk me, and the reason is, he will defend windows even if he has to contradict himself. Features are nice to have but not really needed? On dozens of articles before, your major complaint was the lack of features
What have I said? What were my words? that Linux doesn't have the main things people care about, ease of use, support, and a "it just works" mantra. it hasn't had it, and continues not to have it, and probably won't have it in the future, where is the contradiction?
And you think I'm DEFENDING MSFT? What are you smoking? lets see, what's wrong with MSFT 1.-Their mobile strategy is basically "Ape Apple for all its worth", 2.-Windows 8 will make Vista look like Win95 because instead of the fail that is putting a desktop on a phone they are now gonna put the phone on the desktop, 3.-Frankly they have become so fixated on the consumer market they are ignoring business customers, I believe to their own peril as the business world buys ipads, 4.-Since ballmer took over frankly the ONLY thing they got right was Win 7, and that was the MS office team coming in to right the ship, see Zune, kin, Sidekick, Rushing X360 out with a fatal flaw, etc.
But like it or not the linux community refuses to ask ONE question, the question that frankly could change everything: What are my competitors doing right that we are doing wrong? and the answer is simple...REAL long term support that "just works". I have XP units in the field that are over 8 years old, that's TWO service packs and over 3000 patches, know how many driver failures they've had? ZERO. Zip zilch nada squat. Compare this to linux where the forums tell you with a straight face "You have to install clean"...uhhh...wasn't that what you made fun of Windows for?
The driver model is a bad joke, Linus' kernel fiddling constantly breaks critical drivers, the driver devs simply can't mathematically keep up, its impossible. Rewrite 100,000+ drivers EVERY 6 months? Can't be done. There is ZERO QA, see Dell having to run their own repos (which causes them to LOSE MONEY on every Ubuntu unit sold) because even though they have less than a dozen models they can't get enough QA to keep the mainline from taking a dump on their drivers, too many help files are either cryptic or have a "to do" placeholder, and frankly CLI has become a crutch that devs use as an excuse for bad UIs.
In the end numbers don't lie, linux suffers from what I call the "busted toilets' problem. what that means is because nobody will spend any money on the desktop the nasty boring lousy jobs, QA, regression testing, writing docs, fixing the driver model, all this long term thankless work, well it just never gets done. Everybody wants to be the artist and nobody wants to be the guy that cleans toilets so in the FOSS model they simply don't get cleaned. mark my words Canonical WILL abandon the desktop in less than 3 years, they are bleeding money and have no way to recoup their losses. Did you know that novell only broke even 3 months before they were bought out? that's right it took 20 years just to make nothing, nothing at all, just recouping their losses.
In the end this model simply doesn't work on the desktop. it works on servers because companies will buy support, it works on embedded because companies will buy custom code from the devs, but in desktops the FOSS model is a giant fail. Mandriva, Xandros, gOS, Linspire,Novell, the list of failed desktops goes on and on and Ubuntu WILL be next. Don't blame the messenger when he points out that despite all its flaws both OSX and Win 7 are frankly light years ahead of your offerings in every way, I didn't build the thing YOU the community did. Either fix it or give up, but stop complaining because nobody wants your subpar offerings. When people are willing to steal the other guy's product than take yours for free? that ought to give you a clue that something is horribly wrong.
And you think I'm DEFENDING MSFT? What are you smoking? lets see, what's wrong with MSFT 1.-Their mobile strategy is basically "Ape Apple for all its worth", 2.-Windows 8 will make Vista look like Win95 because instead of the fail that is putting a desktop on a phone they are now gonna put the phone on the desktop, 3.-Frankly they have become so fixated on the consumer market they are ignoring business customers, I believe to their own peril as the business world buys ipads, 4.-Since ballmer took over frankly the ONLY thing they got right was Win 7, and that was the MS office team coming in to right the ship, see Zune, kin, Sidekick, Rushing X360 out with a fatal flaw, etc.
But like it or not the linux community refuses to ask ONE question, the question that frankly could change everything: What are my competitors doing right that we are doing wrong? and the answer is simple...REAL long term support that "just works". I have XP units in the field that are over 8 years old, that's TWO service packs and over 3000 patches, know how many driver failures they've had? ZERO. Zip zilch nada squat. Compare this to linux where the forums tell you with a straight face "You have to install clean"...uhhh...wasn't that what you made fun of Windows for?
The driver model is a bad joke, Linus' kernel fiddling constantly breaks critical drivers, the driver devs simply can't mathematically keep up, its impossible. Rewrite 100,000+ drivers EVERY 6 months? Can't be done. There is ZERO QA, see Dell having to run their own repos (which causes them to LOSE MONEY on every Ubuntu unit sold) because even though they have less than a dozen models they can't get enough QA to keep the mainline from taking a dump on their drivers, too many help files are either cryptic or have a "to do" placeholder, and frankly CLI has become a crutch that devs use as an excuse for bad UIs.
In the end numbers don't lie, linux suffers from what I call the "busted toilets' problem. what that means is because nobody will spend any money on the desktop the nasty boring lousy jobs, QA, regression testing, writing docs, fixing the driver model, all this long term thankless work, well it just never gets done. Everybody wants to be the artist and nobody wants to be the guy that cleans toilets so in the FOSS model they simply don't get cleaned. mark my words Canonical WILL abandon the desktop in less than 3 years, they are bleeding money and have no way to recoup their losses. Did you know that novell only broke even 3 months before they were bought out? that's right it took 20 years just to make nothing, nothing at all, just recouping their losses.
In the end this model simply doesn't work on the desktop. it works on servers because companies will buy support, it works on embedded because companies will buy custom code from the devs, but in desktops the FOSS model is a giant fail. Mandriva, Xandros, gOS, Linspire,Novell, the list of failed desktops goes on and on and Ubuntu WILL be next. Don't blame the messenger when he points out that despite all its flaws both OSX and Win 7 are frankly light years ahead of your offerings in every way, I didn't build the thing YOU the community did. Either fix it or give up, but stop complaining because nobody wants your subpar offerings. When people are willing to steal the other guy's product than take yours for free? that ought to give you a clue that something is horribly wrong.
