No. Take It Around Behind The Barn And Shoot It…
CIO Magazine asks, Should Microsoft Throw Away Vista?
Throw Vista away. That’s what my colleagues at our fellow IDG publication InfoWorld have now argued that Microsoft should do. Give it a dignified resting place, as a stepping-stone OS, and come up with a replacement that’s more sensible for enterprise IT.
Why? Seriously. Why should Bill Gates do any such thing when he owns 90 percent of installed PCs and Office Software Suites? You gonna go somewhere else pal? Where? If your data is in one of Bill’s software products, then Bill owns your data too buddy.
You can’t just ask Bill to please be nice to you. He won’t. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t give a shit about you. You need to take your destiney into your own hands. Or you will never own it.
March 24th, 2008 at 1:26 am
I wish I was smart enough to take on linux. But even that is high-geekery to me. The price is certainly right. But I use a lot of apps that just won’t run right on linux (As far as I know?) Friends swear by Ubuntu.
I have heard NOTHING good about Vista.
If there where any competing OS companies, then NOW would be the perfect time to roll out and push a new product.
March 24th, 2008 at 7:01 am
I have problems with Linux as well. I get round them by having two computers – one in the bedroom running Ubuntu, the other in the lounge running XP. The main programs I use (Firefox & OpenOffice) are both multi-platform, and are also better than the Microsoft equivalents in many respects; the few programs that won’t run on Ubuntu are ones which need the big audio set-up I have in the lounge and/or NOMAD, my main hard-drive, which is also in the lounge – so there’s little point in having them on the Ubuntu PC anyway.
Ubuntu runs much faster than XP, and is lightyears better than the few copies of Vista I’ve had a go on. Unless Microsoft bring out a better OS pretty soon my current main computer is likely to be the last Windows PC I’ll ever own. As it is, if/when I get a laptop it’ll be a Mac, and I *may* see if I can make it a dual-boot with Ubuntu (Bruce – I’m guessing that’s possible?).
One question, Bruce (as a Linux expert) do you think the Logitech diNovo Edge keyboard will work with Ubuntu? I’m seriously considering buying it as the mouse on my current cordless set has pretty much died, and I’d like to get a new keyboard with a laptop-style touchpad, which the DiNovo Edge has. I’ve only found two keyboards so far, and the diNovo Edge has a much better layout.
March 24th, 2008 at 9:57 pm
I wish I was smart enough to take on linux.
You are. It’s just a matter of investing in the time to learn a new OS mostly. There are some things you would find quirky to Unix-like operating systems, especially if you’re used to using the DOS shell. But you learn them and you go on. Installing software is very different. Sometimes all you get is source code and then you have to compile it. But again, that’s mostly just learning how.
What apps do you run that you think you can’t use on Linux? Often, there are open source equivalents. The nice thing about open source is that it’s…well…open. Everyone (well, everyone who knows how to read source code) can see what the software is doing. It’s an open book, so you know it isn’t doing anything sneaky like monitoring your usage and reporting back home like (seriously) some commercial apps do. It’s free, and more importantly, it isn’t under any big corporation’s lock and key, which means your data isn’t either.
But…yeah…there are some things you just can’t do on Linux very well. I hear it’s still a real pain in the ass to get wireless working as simply as on Windows or the Mac.
March 24th, 2008 at 10:12 pm
I have problems with Linux as well. I get round them by having two computers – one in the bedroom running Ubuntu, the other in the lounge running XP.
My biggest problem with Linux is scanner support, and I got around that by buying a Mac. I figured with the Mac’s reputation in the arts and publishing world it made better sense to use a Mac for my art room stuff like the cartoons and photography. Trying to get scanners working well in Linux was just a nightmare.
I know there are Linux versions out there compiled for the PowerPC Macs and I suspect the Intel versions can be made to dual boot easily, or even to run in a VM window using something like Parallels. I don’t think there is a driver for the OSX file system though, so you’d probably have to create a FAT-32 partition if you wanted to share data between your Linux apps and the OSX apps. I still have Windows 2000 running here because my checkbook software only runs on it and I’m still dithering over what to replace it with. I run Windows 2000 on my Linux box (which runs CentOS) using a VM called Win4Lin. Works like a charm. The reason I’m not running Windows XP in that VM is XP’s loathsome software branding technology. I just don’t want to deal with it, so I run Windows 2000 instead.
Here’s a thread on an Ubuntu forum on the diNovo Edge that might be of help. I run CentOS largely because it’s a Red Hat derived distro and I know where things in those are like the libraries and init scripts because at work we use mostly Red Hat Linux (we are a mostly Sun Solaris shop though). Ubuntu is a Debian derived distro as I understand it. I find that whenever I have Linux issues the best thing is to google it and see what pops up. It looks like people are trying the diNovo Edge on Ubuntu.
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=295735
March 25th, 2008 at 8:07 am
Thanks for the link to the Ubuntu forums. I had already found a couple of reviews that said the touchpad on the Edge doesn’t work for Linux, and that forum just confirmed it. Since the touchpad was a the crucial feature, it’s not really of any use to me. I’ve since found a cheaper keyboard which works for Linux, and which has a joystick mouse which should be easier to use than a touchpad. Plus it’s not Bluetooth (easier to set up & run) it’s designed to be used on knees rather than on a table (big bonus when you’re in bed) and according to one guy on eBuyer it’s pretty solidly built too. Some people were actually getting disturbingly enthusiastic about it…