Microsoft VISTA

[Atrocities]

"Windows Vista is a huge leap forward in personal computing. Advances in reliability, security, ease of deployment, performance."

If reading is believing then believe it or not.

Information (http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/basics/default.mspx)

I don't know whether I should laugh or cry at the ubsurd promises that this new OS offers. I seem to recall something very simular being stated about Windows 98, 2000, Me, and Xp and we all know how those turned out.

I base no faith in what MS is selling but will buy it any ways once it goes to market, not because I am desprate for a solid OS, I am, but because its something MS is selling. And we all know what MS sells people buy. Why I simply cannot say, its like I am being commanded to by some sort of back door torjan virus in my mind which is telling me to.

"Buy Vista. Vista is good. Buy Vista"

I wonder how bug infest, virus friendly, user not so friendly, and fiendishly lacking in common sense this new OS will be. Any takers?

[Raging Deadstar]

Atrocities said:
I wonder how bug infest, virus friendly, user not so friendly, and fiendishly lacking in common sense this new OS will be. Any takers?



It will obviously take all of those "features" to unprecedented heights http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Xrati]

It sounds like an extremely LARGE patch for XP! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

[Atrocities]

Oh, but you MUST buy it.... so its not a patch, its a rip off.

[General Woundwort]

Windows Vista: A clear breakthrough

Windows Vista is a huge leap forward in personal computing. Advances in reliability, security, ease of deployment, performance, and manageability make it easy to:


• Confidently do what you want, when you want, and where you want
• Clearly organize your work and play in powerful new ways
• Connect seamlessly with other people, devices, and computers



Are they talking to us, or the hackers? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif Oh, wait, there's more...


Windows Vista is the most secure and trustworthy Windows operating system ever,



Talk about setting the bar high...http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/rolleyes.gif


and it helps organizations achieve their business and computing goals with confidence. Windows Vista security features protect against the latest generation of threats, such as worms, viruses, and malware.



Ah, THAT'S the problem! Microsoft has only NOW realized that there are such things as worms and viruses! That explains a lot, doesn't it? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif


If an attacker manages to compromise a computer, Windows Vista limits the damage.



By committing seppuku, I suppose... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[El_Phil]

I think maybe, just maybe, this time people wont get trapped on the upgrade bandwagon. New features are running out, or at least the useful ones. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

I forget how many but there still a huge chunk of people on Win2K and using Office '97 because they still work. Why upgrade?

Enter stage left Thermodyne ranting about new and better and lots of obscure features no non-admin would ever use.

[Atrocities]

VISTA Is =

Virus
Inviting
****ty
Tech
Assiantance

[bearclaw]

A study was done a few years ago in the US that found that 84% of people were 'followers'. The ones the 'do what they are told'.

13.5% were found to be 'inovators' who will do what seems logical rather than what they are told.

2.5% are concidered 'Pioneers'. They are the ones that will find their own way of doing something.

Based on this, I expect that 84% of people will be out there buying WinVista immidiatly. 13.5% will wait until the bugs have been found and fixed (the major ones anyway) and 2.5% will use something other than Windows completely.

Just my 2 cents.

[Q]

And if the system breaks down you will get the final message:

HASTA LA VISTA BABY

[Ragnarok]

Vista sounds like some kind of cheap Chevy car model.

[Renegade 13]

Q said:
And if the system breaks down you will get the final message:

HASTA LA VISTA BABY


LMAO, good one!

Personally, I'll probably wait for quite a while before I buy Vista (if I ever do). Wait at least a year, probably more until they've found some of the major problems. Only some, because they'll never find them all.

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

El_Phil said:
I forget how many but there still a huge chunk of people on Win2K and using Office '97 because they still work. Why upgrade?



/me uses Win98SE and no Micro-horror Office at all, instead /me uses OpenOffice

[Suicide Junkie]

Go Win98!

Go DOS 5.1!

[El_Phil]

No you want DOS 6.2, DOS at it's best. Apart from the minor problem that bill had stolen the entire disk compression utility from someone else. Well everyone's got to start their lawbreaking somewhere http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Atrocities]

Screw all them there fancy *** rich man programs, I gots me windows 3.11 and I'z stand by it as the greatest OS of all time. And my 386 is the most powerful computer known to man.

(Side Note: While watching "FLED" the Boldwin boy talks briefly about his computer, I laughed so hard I about pee'd myself. "I have this sweet fully loaded 486 with a blazing fast 700 megabite hard drive." - Or something to that effect.)

[El_Phil]

You shouldn't laugh at those poor late 80s early 90s films. They're just trying to be up to date....


What as I saying? It's still damn funny and we all know it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[Thermodyne]

I see a lot of posts here crapping on VISTA. Question would be this; How many of you have actually used it? And how many are just talking out the wrong end of their digestive tracts?

Vista does have a lot of improvements from a security point of view. I doubt they could make the same changes to XP/2K and not require a complete reinstall. And it has a lot of features for the home multimedia market. But I doubt the end product will be entirely like the 1st beta release. But you can bet that it will sell well, the vast majority of the market being preinstalled on new systems.

As to the post speaking to Win2K and Office 97, why replace something that does what you need it to do. In the cooperate world, 2K systems are just reaching end of life cycle, and being phased out. Office 97 is a dinosaur, but if all you do is word process and email, it’s fine. If you look at the fortune 500, there is still a lot of NT and 9x out their. But they are often the same networks making the news with each new worm. I have 600 plus systems on 2K and XP now, and we have almost no MS related failures. I do build custom images that the supplier installs on the new systems, but the changes are mostly related to configuration and preinstalled software. The biggest problems we still have are stupid users opening email attachments and allowing web sites to install software. If the average MS user had the same skills as the average NIX user, MS products would be seen as much more reliable. But then that is one of the main reasons why people pay for MS, it’s more stupid friendly. And the vast majority of computer users are a step below stupid. I wish some of you could sit in on our help desk calls, you would come away with a whole new outlook on the state of the average joe/jane user.

As to the complaints about the way MS does business and prices products, you guys don’t have a clue. Take a look at Autodesk or Microstation, they have some real draconian license systems. Price out some network support software for NIX. Run a help wanted ad for some NIX network staff. You will never be the same after those interviews!

Now….don’t take this personal or feel insulted. But if you are running 9x you need to spend a few bucks and buy XP. And if you have XP and good hardware, and it’s not stable, you need to buy a book-take a class-hire some skilled help-what ever it takes to get your system set up properly. If you suffer from worms, viruses or spyware, see above, and for god’s sake get a hardware firewall and lock it down. Seriously guys, I don’t have any of the problems that I see posted here with the exception of crappy IDE hard drives, and I don’t buy them any more except for laptops. I do use a hardware firewall, I do run up to date AV software, and I do apply patches ASAP. I also have all of my systems on UPS’s. I don’t visit known loader web sites,I don’t open email attachment from unkiwn senders, and only from known senders when I’m expecting them to send me something. I do scan inbound email with AV software even though live scanning slows down the system. I don’t use protos that are known to be comp’d, and I don’t use crappy hardware just because it was cheap or on sale. I run many flavors of windows, I run some NIX, and I run some FreeBSD, they all work well for me. I can’t remember the last time I had a system crash that wasn’t do to some type of stupidity on my part or a dead hard drive.

In closing let me say this; I used to do a lot of work on home user systems, I don’t do it any more unless I just can’t get out of it. I found that I was working my *** off, not making decent money and more often than not the damage was self inflicted. Usually I had to be bull****ingly polite, all the while I was wanting to say “Here’s your sign”.

[Arkcon]

When I heard months ago that the new more efficient hard drive allocation format was removed from Vista because it wouldn't be ready in time, I lost the last scrap of faith I had in Microslime. They don't want to innovate, they just want to slap a new GUI on peoples desktops every couple of years so people will be envious and want to buy it themselves. If I have to upgrade from Win-2K, I'll try Linux again.

[Thermodyne]

Arkcon said:
When I heard months ago that the new more efficient hard drive allocation format was removed from Vista because it wouldn't be ready in time, I lost the last scrap of faith I had in Microslime. They don't want to innovate, they just want to slap a new GUI on peoples desktops every couple of years so people will be envious and want to buy it themselves. If I have to upgrade from Win-2K, I'll try Linux again.



The file system is ready to test. The delay is do to legal not signing off on it. With the issuance of patents on IT ideas, it is becoming unprofitable to innovate and bring new products to market.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

...And one truely atrocious pun...

[Kamog]

Q said:
And if the system breaks down you will get the final message:
HASTA LA VISTA BABY


http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif That's the funniest thing I've read in a long time! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[El_Phil]

No windows product has ever lived up to the hype or what it's supposed to do. Ever. Thus you can easily say it will be awful because it will.

Hell I dislike the entire idea, you shouldn't care about the OS. What extra features, discounting security which Bill f*cked up in the first place, have been added since 95, hell since 3.1? I mean genuine 'Woot I've noticed a difference.'

FAT32, ICS that works and slightly easier networking. I'm sure there's loads of things behind the scenes, but I haven't noticed them and all they've done is slow it down. It was said a '95 game ran, like for like, at least 10% slower than it's DOS equivalent. How bad is it now do you think?

[Thermodyne]

What about ntfs? Group policy? Fast user switching? And only a fool would say that netbios/win's is better than tcp/ip and dns.

[NullAshton]

Don't forget about a shinier interface, less crashes, and more compatability. XP is compatible with almost every program, if you take the time to tweak the compatibility settings. And there's the shiney interface... shiney interface, more shiney interfaces...

[El_Phil]

Group policy and user switching. Well as its just me on this machine why would I care?

NTFS is wonderful, apart from nothing else being able to even look at it, so I don't use it. And all the volume security and other such stuff, yes I'm sure its wonderful for admins. I'm not an admin.

As I said the networkings gotten better. Not as fast as it should and it still could be better, but yes Bill did add TCP/IP. Woot.

Less crashes? Maybe. I had a WinME system that was solid. I realise though that I was perhaps just lucky with my hardware choices, others hated ME and all it stood for. XP on the other hand had to be reinstalled about 3 times in the first month (OK bad stats there as I had misc. hardware problems complicating things. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif)

And compatability. Well if Bill hadn't changed everything for no benefit (to me at least. I was never a security muppet, I had a firewall and anti-virus) with XP the it wouldn't need compatability.

Ohh shinier. Which in fact means 'slower'.

[Atrocities]

Most of us are basing our opinions of Vista on PAST experience with Microsft products. Lets count them... shall we.

Windows 95
Windows 98
Windows 98 2nd addition
Windows ME
Windows NT
Windows 2000
Windows XP Home
Windows XP Professional

Of these I would say that most were NOT what they were billed to be. Hense the execution of Bill Gates in the South Park movie!

[NullAshton]

Shiney is good. Besides, you're not REALLY going to use all that 3.0 gigahertz of raw processing power, are you? Or 4 GHZ, or 5... Eh, you can turn it off if you want.

3.1 RULES! Simple, and to the point. Great for old laptops!

[Suicide Junkie]

Thermodyne said:
As to the post speaking to Win2K and Office 97, why replace something that does what you need it to do.

...

Now….don’t take this personal or feel insulted. But if you are running 9x you need to spend a few bucks and buy XP.

I'm sorry, but you've got mixed messages there.
As you mentioned in the middle bit, if you don't pimp your PC to all the viruses worms and trojans on the internet, it will work quite nicely. And in that case, win9x is perfectly fine too.


Thermy:
I wish some of you could sit in on our help desk calls, you would come away with a whole new outlook on the state of the average joe/jane user.
---
-= True story =-
Customer: ...Blah Blah Blah... Internet won't work!
Tech: I don't see your modem in my list, so try restarting it. Unplug the modem, wait 30 seconds and then plug it back in.
Customer: ...I don't think that's safe...
Tech: http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/confused.gif ... Um, ... why would you say that?
Customer: Well, the basement is flooded and the plug is under water.

[Combat Wombat]

Thermo is completely right. If your not dumb when your using the computer you shouldn't have problems. The only Microsoft OS I have ever had problems with is Windows ME but I blame HPs slow destruction of Compaqs computer quality for that...

[Atrocities]

I have Office 97 and 2000. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif I paid good money for both.

I also have, albeit I cannot find it, full version of win 98 2nd Edition, Win2k, and XP Pro.

I can only use the XP Pro on ONE machine so I am saving it.
I use Win2k on only one machine but I can use it on more... but I do not.

[Puke]

Thermo has it spot-on, but I dont expect anyone to agree with him. If you're happy hateing Microsoft, then keep on keeping on.

as with most things, each iteration of the windows operating system (with a couple of short-lived exceptions) has been better than the last. more stable, robust, secure. sure its sometimes a good idea to wait until SP1 comes out, but thats true for ANY developer's software.

And if you have been keeping up with Longhorn development news, you'd already know that the portents for this release are pretty good. If you've only been keeping up with the hype, then you can keep on hating Microsoft and think they're copy cats that have stolen the Mac desktop theme. Ignore that Mac stole it from Gnome / KDE, which are both efforts to copy / improve on windows.

The GUI wars go back to Xerox PARC; who cares where the first good idea came from, I'll take practical useability over originality any day of the week.

[Kamog]

Well, I didn't notice much improvement from Windows 95 to 98 to ME, but Windows XP is definitely more stable and crashes much less often. I use XP at work and sometimes a month goes by without any problems.

[Renegade 13]

ME was, for me, a piece of trash. Crashed constantly. Now XP...works great for me, has never (that I can remember) crashed on me, and I've never had a security breach that I know of. Then again, I keep the antivirus up to date, don't open emails and/or attachments that I dont' know who they're from, have firewalls installed, etc. Which, as other's have said, is plenty used in conjunction with XP.

People hate MS because people hate success. That's just how the human psyche works it seems. He's successful, and we want to be as successful as he is, but can't be, so we'll hate him instead.

[parabolize]

Puke said:
If you've only been keeping up with the hype, then you can keep on hating Microsoft and think they're copy cats that have stolen the Mac desktop theme. Ignore that Mac stole it from Gnome / KDE, which are both efforts to copy / improve on windows.

The GUI wars go back to Xerox PARC; who cares where the first good idea came from, I'll take practical useability over originality any day of the week.


Hay! What about Enlightenment and Solaris? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

[Puke]

anyone going to the expense of running solaris shouldnt really be slowing it down with a gui. but, whatever.

I count ME as a short lived exception. it filled a tiny gap between 98se and XP for a short period of time, and never really needed to exist.

and pretty much any "home" version of anything - which are basically stripped down versions of the real version, with more wizards and irritating assumptions made for you. and more packaged software... dont forget the preinstalled garbage.

which is another reason alot of home users dont think windows works. it comes with all sorts of crazy junk from manufacturers and advertising partners that is likely to screw up your PC. I think its a testament to window's stability that it runs AT ALL with that garbage on there, and that its possible to write such diverse and unregulated trash in the first place.

[NullAshton]

Windows is the only operating system that runs my games. That's all I need.

[Atrocities]

NullAshton said:
Windows is the only operating system that runs my games. That's all I need.



Truer words have never been spoken. - Well said.

[NullAshton]

Besides, it comes preinstalled on what? 95% or more of computers? Hey, it comes with the computer, it works, it's compatible with practically everything, what more could you ask for?

[Atrocities]

I just got my confirmation about the HP suite yestarday. Sure enough people are pissed off about the OS being stored on a partition of the HD and not getting a back up disk with the info. (Kinda hard to install an OS when the OS is on the drive that FAILED!!!!)

It asks me to sign a statement swaring that I am the ORIGINAL owner of the PC. Well I am not..... by that I mean this..

It was sent to me DIRECTLY from HP as a new Computer, however, it did belong to someone before me as I discovered when the CDROM failed. So what do I do??? Do I say I am the original owner? I cannot, I have to call the law firm that is handling the case and be advised. I will not purger myself for a free copy of an OS that should have been given with the PC! HP is EVIL!!

[NullAshton]

If a friend works for a software company, you can get their developer OS disks and not have to pay for the OS... My dad works at a software company, and he gets the latest stuff of anything dealing with software. Free developer studio, free microsoft office, free operating systems... And sometimes free computers!

[El_Phil]

Renegade 13 said:
People hate MS because people hate success. That's just how the human psyche works it seems. He's successful, and we want to be as successful as he is, but can't be, so we'll hate him instead.



I don't hate success, I just dislike seeing cheaters prosper. He's broken many laws and gotten a minor slap on the wrist, it is annoying.

However Windows is still better than the competiton, no-one has produced anything better for my gaming needs. Yes Bill has done everything in his power to stifle and stop any competition, but that's the world. If he'd done it fairly I wouldn't mind.

What I dislike is breaking the law to do so and then not getting punished for it.

[parabolize]

NullAshton said:
Windows is the only operating system that runs my games. That's all I need.


Give me a list of the games you play. The ones I know you play do run on other OS (though not natively with se4).

[parabolize]

NullAshton said:
Besides, it comes preinstalled on what? 95% or more of computers? Hey, it comes with the computer, it works, it's compatible with practically everything, what more could you ask for?


95% of the PCs? I don't know but that sounds about right.
95% of computers? Are you out of your mind?

[bearclaw]

I'm all with Thermodyne on this topic. Can't recall where the comment came from but it was said years ago that Computer are NOT ready for the general public to use, but without the general public using them, they never will be. I see this time period as the same as when you had to crank your phone to get an operator, then tell them who you wanted to call, they 'rang' the exchange with a certain coded ring (2 short, 1 long for instance) and everyone's phone would ring. Then you had to hope that the correct person you were calling picks up their phone and not their neighbor.

It's all growing pains. IMO, it will be a while yet before we've got the idiot proof computer but it took 25-30 years to get the idiot proof phone.

[NullAshton]

Phones can be ruined my idiots? That, I have to see for myself.

Why would I only play se4? Sure, it runs on other systems with emulators... But is that all to life? Wine would have a fit if it tried running Battlefield 2, much less all these other games I have. Star Wars Galaxies, Planetside, some other games I'm sure... Windows is simply the best OS for the job of playing games.

[parabolize]

NullAshton said:
If a friend works for a software company, you can get their developer OS disks and not have to pay for the OS... My dad works at a software company, and he gets the latest stuff of anything dealing with software. Free developer studio, free microsoft office, free operating systems... And sometimes free computers!


Here you go lots of "free" software. DistroWatch.com (http://distrowatch.com/)

[El_Phil]

All new in Vista.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/13/gates_vista/

So we have RSS, better searching and flipping windows. And who knows how much slower. Oh and they'll be porting bits of it to XP anyway.

If your getting a new machine with an OS installed it might as well be the newest one (if you can't get a bare bones machine) but I'm not seeing any compelling reason to change. Of course I thought that about XP until multiple programmes would only run properly, or at all, under it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/rolleyes.gif

[NullAshton]

Meh, linux? Not good if you're a windows user, like me...

[Renegade 13]

El_Phil said:

Renegade 13 said:
People hate MS because people hate success. That's just how the human psyche works it seems. He's successful, and we want to be as successful as he is, but can't be, so we'll hate him instead.



I don't hate success, I just dislike seeing cheaters prosper. He's broken many laws and gotten a minor slap on the wrist, it is annoying.

However Windows is still better than the competiton, no-one has produced anything better for my gaming needs. Yes Bill has done everything in his power to stifle and stop any competition, but that's the world. If he'd done it fairly I wouldn't mind.

What I dislike is breaking the law to do so and then not getting punished for it.



What laws has he broken? I'm sincerely curious here, not trying to be argumentative, by the way http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif I don't really keep up on that kind of thing!

[NullAshton]

I think there was a few anti-trust lawsuits or something.

[Suicide Junkie]

Atrocities said:
It asks me to sign a statement swaring that I am the ORIGINAL owner of the PC. Well I am not..... by that I mean this..

It was sent to me DIRECTLY from HP as a new Computer, however, it did belong to someone before me as I discovered when the CDROM failed. So what do I do??? Do I say I am the original owner? I cannot, I have to call the law firm that is handling the case and be advised. I will not purger myself for a free copy of an OS that should have been given with the PC! HP is EVIL!!

How about signing and mailing a handwritten copy of the thing, with the only difference being you write "legal owner" instead of "original owner"?

[El_Phil]

Mainly monopoly laws, or anti-trust as the Americans call it. Also unpleasent buisness practices.

In no paticular order it was illegaly nasty to IBM.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/07/01/ibm_ms_settle/
There was also deliberatly writing programs to break if IBMs Dr DOS was detected so programmes would only work on MS DOS. Not perhaps illegal, but underhand.

Commited serious anti-trust offences (Became a monopoly illegaly and then abused its position)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/11/01/judge_backs_msdoj_deal_microsoft/
But got off when Bush got into power (allegedly http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif). In any case the DoJ cut a deal shortly after the election

Oh and annoyed the EU by abusing its dominant OS position to force feed media player to customers. There are other cases still ambling through the courts.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/06/09/ms_wmp_windows/

There has also been a very clear understanding, if OEMs and system builders wanted to have Windows then on competing software could be bundled. This would be fine, but by this time ('98 ish) Windows was a defacto monopoly and so it would be commercial suicide not to sell PCs with Windows on. This is called 'Abusing a monopoly position.'

[El_Phil]

Atrocities said:
I just got my confirmation about the HP suite yestarday. Sure enough people are pissed off about the OS being stored on a partition of the HD and not getting a back up disk with the info. (Kinda hard to install an OS when the OS is on the drive that FAILED!!!!)

It asks me to sign a statement swaring that I am the ORIGINAL owner of the PC. Well I am not..... by that I mean this..

It was sent to me DIRECTLY from HP as a new Computer, however, it did belong to someone before me as I discovered when the CDROM failed. So what do I do??? Do I say I am the original owner? I cannot, I have to call the law firm that is handling the case and be advised. I will not purger myself for a free copy of an OS that should have been given with the PC! HP is EVIL!!



Well do remember, you don't own any Microsoft OS, you lease it. That is what the EULA says, its leased not brought. I would imagine that produces all sorts of horrible legal problems, or at least expensive ones knowing lawyers http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Seriously though good luck fighting this and I hope you do win. Never much liked HP, always seemed like a bunch of jumped up printer makers. A nice bit of embaressment and coughing up for being tight on new PCs would do them some good. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[parabolize]

NullAshton said:
Phones can be ruined my idiots? That, I have to see for myself.

Why would I only play se4? Sure, it runs on other systems with emulators... But is that all to life? Wine would have a fit if it tried running Battlefield 2, much less all these other games I have. Star Wars Galaxies, Planetside, some other games I'm sure... Windows is simply the best OS for the job of playing games.


BF2 is not working in wine or cedega but it does work on other OS (PS2 Xbox). I don't think its going to Mac. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif BF3 will though. Looks like Star Wars Galaxies runs in cedega but not wine. Planetside is not yet working in wine.

[NullAshton]

See? Most of the games I play won't work on linux.

[parabolize]

NullAshton said:
See? Most of the games I play won't work on linux.


Yes.

NullAshton said:
Windows is simply the best OS for the job of playing games.


For ATI cards yes, NVIDIA no. Most of the games that have been ported to Linux run faster in Linux with NVIDIA cards (Doom3 doesn't if your CPU is the bottle-neck because they tried to take some of the work load off the ATI cards). ATI may make some drivers for Linux that actually work in the future. Linux is ready for gaming and stupid users in general. The problem is not enough people are running Linux. Why make a port to a OS if your not going to sell? Most people who have ported games to Linux did it so they could get some good dedicated servers.

[Atrocities]

I read the thing more closely and the wording allows for GIFT or other method of ownership.

Any whoo, I have a copy of the document if any one wants to read it.

[Thermodyne]

Well, back in the day there were lots of OS’s for small computers. IBM was running DOS which it got from MS. And MS did not steal DOS; they just made a very good deal to get it. People were not buying many computers for home or desktop use. It took a few years to learn to operate them and there were not a lot of boxed apps. Then Windows came along and people started buying personal computers. Then developers demanded 32bit support and better memory management, so Win 95 hit the shelves. But it was still DOS. NT hit the business world about the same time, and was more stable than 95, but not as easy to use and with few home user bells and whistles. The ease of use with 95 caused sales to take off, and prices began to fall. Then 98 and 98se came along as improvements of 95. But they were still DOS and had memory and driver issues. So then we got 98me which didn’t support kernel loaded drivers, but had poor legacy support and suffered from a lot of poorly written drivers from developers that were having to relearn writing drivers. And it had no way to stop you from loading DOS based drivers into the kernel, and were at the mercy of the driver supplier. At about this time, NT5 is ready to test, and someone got the idea to add bells and whistles to it so the home user would buy it. So then we got 2K which addressed the memory issues and got the drivers out of the root kernel once and for all and solved most of the driver burn downs. Developers had experience writing NT drivers, but there were still a lot of poorly written ones being pushed out. Also, it wouldn’t run a lot of legacy software. So the we get NT6 or Windows XP. It addresses driver problems by asking you not to install unapproved versions. And it will run most old software if you have the ability to read some directions and implement them. It also has lots of stuff for the home user and other stuff for the business world. Problem was that NT memory management was more or less maxed out and hacking had become main stream. Some of the best developers in the world were busy finding ways into other peoples computers. So MS decides to dump NT and bring a new OS to market. They asked the hardware world to make some changes, and started writing code. While this was going on, it suddenly got hard to copy write code. A single line of base everyday code could bring down a million lines if someone had included it in some other million lines of code. And the hardware peeps said no to almost every change they were asked to make. Although better memory management did see the light of day in 64 bit. So now we are about to get Longhorn. It has been forced to use NT core code because hardware is still x86, but has better memory management and much better driver handling. A lot of the new features have never gotten out of legal, and others will not be included because antitrust has done its best to pull MS back down the level of third world code shops. But it will be a step forward.

Start Rant/

IMHO, the world should have a standardized operating system and it should not be free. Every PC should run on it so that every user could operate every PC. And people should make money from it, so that there will always be people willing to invest large parts of their lives working on improving it. IPv6 should be pushed out asap, and with that done, hackers should be run to ground and harshly punished. Something along the lines of 10 years in supermax with meal time being bobbing for apples in boiling acid. The developed world should have fiber to every home and business. And the undeveloped world should be left the FUC alone. When they evolve beyond their stupid tribal methods of organization and draconian religious fantasies, we’ll welcome them with open arms. Until then, we should not pull the advanced parts of the world down to their level. You can buy a PC with MS OS and Apps for $500 US, and the money that is pilfered from UN aid packages to the third world would pay for an IPv6 rollout in three years. And while I’m on this rant, the USofA gave the world the PC, a user friendly OS, the internet, and the hardware and code to make it work. The rest of the world should shut the FUC up and not try to take it over. If they don’t like it, they should just cut the wires and put up something of their own. With their own hardware designs, their own code, and built in their own fabs. I’m sorry, but it just makes me LOL. If this ever happened, can you imagine what would come to be in Iran? The PC would shut down several times a day for prayers. Visit a porno site and the PC would kill you. Or what would the old USSR’s version of the internet have been like? Go to the wrong web site and there would be a knock on the door. Order a new PC and get on a thirty year waiting list. What about some more advanced countries, 8088’s and 14k would be the standard so long as it was all supplied by in country industry. And every summer it would all shut down for three weeks. And lastly, what if Billy G had never taken the risk, and we were still using whatever IBM had to offer. There would be a 100 OS’s each serving 1/2% of the market on proprietary systems and something from IBM that took a masters degree to use running on the rest. Well perhaps not that bad, but you can bet that we would have a lot less than we have now and we would be paying a lot more for it.

[El_Phil]

Calm down Themy. Seriously that can't be healthy for you. Whatever tablets the doctor gave you, take double the dosage. Or just stop taking them.

I'm going to take a stab here, but you've got an MCSE haven't you?

[Suicide Junkie]

IMHO, the world should have a standardized operating system and it should not be free. Every PC should run on it so that every user could operate every PC.

Ye gods. That's horrible.

It would be like a state sponsored, "Floppy-disk" thumping religion which also has a license to print money.

A strong disincentive to innovate too, since any changes will threaten them and their free money.

PS:
As a matter of practicality, would these PC Police be trying to install DOS 1.0 on my Ghz desktop, or WindowsXP on my 16mhz 80806 box?
Or would they just be burning me at the stake?

[Thermodyne]

El_Phil said:
Calm down Themy. Seriously that can't be healthy for you. Whatever tablets the doctor gave you, take double the dosage. Or just stop taking them.

I'm going to take a stab here, but you've got an MCSE haven't you?



I'm fine, just felt like spouting off.

No MCSE here, no A+ and no Net+. Lots of MCP's but I seldom do anything that has much to do with them. If I had my preference, I’d still be bending wrenches, which was my second occupation and something that I actually enjoyed. But old age and a blown out elbow dictated other wise. After the doc pinned, stapled, and stitched me back together, twice, he suggested that I find something easy to do. I had already taught myself the hardware end of it. And had some formal training on dc electronics back in the 70’s. So I took some classes on 2K and went looking for a job. I couldn’t get anyone to even read my resume, so I hung out my own shingle. Got lots of clients did lots of work and almost lost my butt after the 2K build out. So I sold my business and went to back work at a government agency as a volunteer just to force my foot in the door. Then to make things worse, the guy I sold out to couldn’t make his payments to the bank and I ended up getting 65% of it back. So to make a long story short, now I do 40+ a week for the state on a no bid contract and 15 to 40 more for A&K Ltd. More or less everything I really needed to know was learned on the job, and I brought the problem solving and customer support skills with me. I should take the last two exams and get my MCSE, but just don’t have the time. On top of the hours I work, there is a 120 mile a day commute. As I type this, the servers are grinding away on offsite backups and the printer is hammering away on verification logs. And since it’s almost the 15th, soon as the printer is free, I’ll start printing invoices for the dead beats that have yet to pay July’s billing. Then because tomorrow is pay day, I’ll be printing out checks for the 8 most over paid people in the known world. After that I’ll sleep till 4am and start it all over again. Almost forgot, I still need to put today’s tapes in the safe and set tomorrows exchanges up so the lazy *** currier can pick them up at 9:30-10:00 and then complain about all the traffic she has to fight. I don’t suppose you’d be in the market for controlling interest in an IT support business specializing in disaster recovery and SBS installations/support?

[Renegade 13]

I agree heartily with a lot of that Thermo, but not all, especially one part. I bet there were people from a bunch of different countries who brought the world the PC, internet, and good OS. For instance, I bet there've been a whole lot of Canadians who worked in the US to help bring the PC, internet, and good OS http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif So don't be so hasty to cut us out! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

EDIT: Referring to the first rant http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[El_Phil]

Sady not. But in light of that story I can understand the need for a rant. Letting of steam is good for the soul. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

This seems in contradiction of my discussion with Ashton about the joys of repression and denial. As they say 'To each according to his need, from each from his ability.' Some things need to be let out and some things should be repressed, it depends upon the circumstances, as all things do.

"Nothing is more useless than a general maxim."

[Thermodyne]

Renegade 13 said:
I agree heartily Thermo, except for one part. I bet there were people from a bunch of different countries who brought the world the PC, internet, and good OS. For instance, I bet there've been a whole lot of Canadians who worked in the US to help bring the PC, internet, and good OS http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif So don't be so hasty to cut us out! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif



Might have been some working at IBM (PC), but there wern't any at DARPA (First redundant wide area network) and none at MS (OS) in the early days.

PS: I guess I could have just said “America”. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

[Renegade 13]

Ah well, guess I've showed my ignorance again!

[Thermodyne]

Naa, don’t worry about it. I guess that’s what comes from sharing the largest open border in the world. The only thing you all need to worry about is global warming. First the killer bees and fire ants will crossover, followed by 40 million hard working Central Americans looking for the good life

[Fyron]

Thermodyne said:
And it will run most old software if you have the ability to read some directions and implement them.

In my experience, this has been blatantly untrue. For me, very few old DOS or win95 era games ever worked with XP compatibility mode. win2k has pretty much the same compatibility layer that XP does, though perhaps slightly less refined, which can be enabled by registering slayer.dll. The XP version seems to have just as much hit and miss rate as the 2k version. DosBOX or a win98 partition are the only ways to go for old Windows software compatibility...

[Atrocities]

I find XP and win2k to work well with some of my old games like Dark Forces.... however, sound drivers are something else.

[Renegade 13]

Thermodyne said:
Naa, don’t worry about it. I guess that’s what comes from sharing the largest open border in the world. The only thing you all need to worry about is global warming. First the killer bees and fire ants will crossover, followed by 40 million hard working Central Americans looking for the good life


It's odd...there's actually very little distinction nowadays between Canadians and Americans. We essentially share...everything. Culture, technology, trade, language, religions, basic political systems, etc. We may as well just amalgamate and be done with it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif Actually, bad idea. Seeing as how Canada is larger than the US, but with only 1/10 the population, it'd be a little difficult to get fair representation in federal government. More likely is having Western Canada (Manitoba and all provinces west) separating from the rest of Canada.

Wow, I've really managed to get off topic. Sorry!

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Canada as part of the US would be a blip on the map.

Canada as it's own country is actually something to notice.

[Renegade 13]

Yep, I agree with that too. /threads/images/Graemlins/Flag_Canada.gif /threads/images/Graemlins/Flag_Canada.gif It seems I'm quite agreeable today. And talkative. /threads/images/Graemlins/Flag_Canada.gif /threads/images/Graemlins/Flag_Canada.gif

Now if only the US would give us back the $5 Billion they stole from us with the illegal duties on softwood lumber, I'd be happy http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[parabolize]

IMHO, the world should have a standardized transportation system and it should not be free. Every city should run on it so that every city would connect seamlessly. And people should make money from it, so that there will always be people willing to invest large parts of their lives working on improving it. More trafficking police asap, and with that done, smugglers should be run to ground and harshly punished. Something along the lines of 10 years in supermax with meal time being bobbing for apples in boiling acid. The developed world should have subways to every home and business. And the undeveloped world should be left the FUC alone. When they evolve beyond their stupid tribal methods of organization and draconian religious fantasies, we’ll welcome them with open arms. Until then, we should not pull the advanced parts of the world down to their level. You can pay $500,000 US for your part of the transportation system, this would pay for an subway rollout in three years. And while I’m on this rant, the USofA gave the world the Diesel-electric train, the model T and their blue prints. The rest of the world should shut the FUC up and not try to take it over. If they don’t like it, they should just close their ports and put up something of their own. With their own subway designs, their own trains, and build their own cars. I’m sorry, but it just makes me LOL. If this ever happened, can you imagine what would come to be in Iran? The trains would shut down several times a day for prayers. Visit a drug dealer and the train would kill you. Or what would the old USSR’s version of the roads have been like? Go to the wrong street and there would be a knock on the car door. Streets would take 30 years to build. What about some more advanced countries, steam engines and horses would be the standard so long as it was all supplied by in country industry. And every summer it would all shut down for three weeks. And lastly, what if Jay Gould and Jim Fisk had never taken the risk, and we were still using ferries and oxen. There would be a 100 train companies each serving 1/2% of the market on proprietary land and lots of train wrecks with the New York Central. Well perhaps not that bad, but you can bet that we would have a lot less than we have now and we would be paying a lot more for it.
God Bless America
War Is Peace
Freedom Is Slavery
Ignorance Is Strength

[parabolize]

Suicide Junkie said:

IMHO, the world should have a standardized operating system and it should not be free. Every PC should run on it so that every user could operate every PC.


Ye gods. That's horrible.

It would be like a state sponsored, "Floppy-disk" thumping religion which also has a license to print money.

A strong disincentive to innovate too, since any changes will threaten them and their free money.

PS:
As a matter of practicality, would these PC Police be trying to install DOS 1.0 on my Ghz desktop, or WindowsXP on my 16mhz 80806 box?
Or would they just be burning me at the stake?


What about Macs, routers, ISP and digital-wristwatchs? If this only pretains to PC I will be happy to buy a Mac and put Linux on it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

Do you not believe in freedom of speech? Do you not consider computer code a form of communication? Are you a fascist?

[Puke]

i see that you are trying to be sarcastic, but you are more correct than you would like to think. in the old USSR, it did take ages to get any public works projects done. roads ran up to a river, and continued on the other side - with no bridge!

In the middle east, railroads pass from oil wells to refineries, going through cities but not stopping in them. because they are wells and refineries that belong to the western world, and theres no use in spending money trying to develop the third world. you poke fun at the idea, but who the hell is going to fund a subway system in the Sudan? its not worth the time or money, and it would just be destroyed in a civil war anyway.

The world would stand to benefit from a standardized public transit system, and the US did pioneer alot of it. do you know how many different railroad gauges there are in the UK? you cant move a train from one track to another!

The computing world needs standards too. but free commerce dictates that the only standards we will have will be of the defacto sort. and our rails will never be standardized. and in the US, are rails will never be fully utilized because of the oil, tire, and highway industries that keep mass transit suppressed.

So there are lots of things that SHOULD be done, that never will.

[parabolize]

i see that you are trying to be sarcastic, but you are more correct than you would like to think. in the old USSR, it did take ages to get any public works projects done. roads ran up to a river, and continued on the other side - with no bridge!


All countries have transportation problems. Open a map for Colorado Springs. We let the real estate agents make are roads! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/Sick.gif

In the middle east, railroads pass from oil wells to refineries, going through cities but not stopping in them. because they are wells and refineries that belong to the western world, and theres no use in spending money trying to develop the third world. you poke fun at the idea, but who the hell is going to fund a subway system in the Sudan? its not worth the time or money, and it would just be destroyed in a civil war anyway.


Iran and Turkey have many railroads that were made even before oil was being refined. Oil is often moved by pipe line.


The world would stand to benefit from a standardized public transit system, and the US did pioneer alot of it. do you know how many different railroad gauges there are in the UK? you cant move a train from one track to another!


And USA railroads have always been standardized?


The computing world needs standards too. but free commerce dictates that the only standards we will have will be of the defacto sort. and our rails will never be standardized. and in the US, are rails will never be fully utilized because of the oil, tire, and highway industries that keep mass transit suppressed.


The GNU community IS making GUI standards. They ARE working with Mac and Solaris. KDE and Mac have been handing code back and forth for a long time now; they are both using khtml. Everybody is complying with the w3c BUT IE. As Thermodyne pointed out IPv6 is coming (slowly though).

[El_Phil]

Well for starters the UKs had a 'Standard Gauge' act since the 1840s, with only the Great Western any different. And even that was changed over 1892 (Overnight. As in literally one nights work! Amazing what you can do with no H&S to slow you down). So actually all UK railtracks are the same gauge and have been for over a centuty. (The things you learn playing Railtoad Tycoon hey. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif)

The US didn't pioneer standard gauge, the NE US used standard (copied off the Brits I might add http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif) and the rest used random sizes, anywhere between 4ft and 6ft in fact. This was a problem when railroads started to meet up, so eventually late 1880s they went for standard gauge for all US rail, spending the next few years doing all the conversions. So in fact US rails have been standardised, again for about a century.

This doesn't bode well for you arguments Puke, if I'm honest. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

Especially as computer hardware has standards, rock solid ones. You can buy any hardware from any company and it will work in your machine as long as both are on the same standard. How many other industries can say that?

Software is shakier, mainly as MS changes standards to make them more propietry. Internet Explorer is not standard compliant off the top of my head.


Finally I think Sir Tim Berners-Lee and CERN would have something to say about inventing the internet as we know it. Quite alot actually.

[Baron Munchausen]

Renegade 13 said:
It's odd...there's actually very little distinction nowadays between Canadians and Americans. We essentially share...everything. Culture, technology, trade, language, religions, basic political systems, etc. We may as well just amalgamate and be done with it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif Actually, bad idea. Seeing as how Canada is larger than the US, but with only 1/10 the population, it'd be a little difficult to get fair representation in federal government. More likely is having Western Canada (Manitoba and all provinces west) separating from the rest of Canada.

Wow, I've really managed to get off topic. Sorry!



No, Canadians would tip the narrowly balanced system to the left and we could finally have some things that other civilized countries in the world have had for decades, like national health care.

[NullAshton]

Is this topic still on technology, or have we completly abandoned the topic?

[narf poit chez BOOM]

To-pic? What is this 'To-pic' of which you speak?

[NullAshton]

The 'To-pic' is what's above and to the right of your cartoony head.

[El_Phil]

Well we've never stayed on topic before. I don't see why we should start now.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

No, no, no, that's the corner of the post border.

[Thermodyne]

El_Phil said:


Finally I think Sir Tim Berners-Lee and CERN would have something to say about inventing the internet as we know it. Quite alot actually.



Sir Tim was responsible for the www. That we love so much, not the redundant WAN. DARPA and a few universities sitting on a bunch of fed funded supercomputing developed the RWAN. Public side of it was to insure communications if the cold war went hot in a limited exchange. Private side and the reason that the Air force poured money into it was to influence the Soviet target list. When it went on line in 66 IIRC, most of the nodes were located in out of the way low target value areas. Data transmission was coded teletype. Later, the same wires carried the first binary data. Security was pressurized conduit. But soon after, the CIA/Navy developed a way to tap pressurized conduit, but that’s another story some of you may have heard parts of.

As for CERN, they have added a lot of functionality to the net, but they to came late to the game, building on DOD technology. Also of note would be that TCP/IP came from the DOD. If they had chosen to sit on it, we would probably started the WWW with IDP/SPP or DECnet, which was the high power network of the early 80’s DEC Pathworks was how Apple, DOS and Windows connected to it. And of late, the NIX community has started to use it again.

[Sivran]

Security.

Take a 9x machine.
Install TCP.
Connect to Net.

Take a XP SP1 machine.
Install TCP.
Connect to Net.

Which box gets rooted?
That's right--the XP box.

Why?
Exploitable services exposed to the net.

Now put the two in the soft and gooey interior of a LAN. They'll both get 0wned. Why? File sharing was installed, of course, and being on the "protected" interior of the LAN, they don't have any workstation-level protection installed and thus fall to the next worm that gets through the LAN's eggshell exterior.

But Sivran, Microsoft issued a patch!
Ah, but patches, after the arduous Microsoft testing cycle, must also face the corporate testing cycle, delaying implementation perhaps long enough for the network to get 0wned.

Games.

Take an old game. Let's say Descent, or Descent II. Install on 98. Game runs. Joystick may be a hassle depending on model, but game runs. Install on XP. Game does not run. Compatability mode isn't.

"Up"grading.

In all seriousness, why should someone downgrade from 98SE to XP? What benefits do they get, that they cannot also get from 2k if they seriously need it?

They will still face the same spyware threats. They will still face the same browser exploit threats. They will still face email-borne virus threats.

They will not face the worm-without-user-intervention threats--9x is not susceptible at all unless file and print sharing is exposed. XP is susceptible, even if file and print sharing isn't even there.

Software still runs on 9x. 9x can be quite stable--the trick, I find, is simply not using IE, and avoiding memory and resource-leaking programs like some ancient versions of ZoneAlarm.

Multimedia still plays on 9x. Just need the codecs.

Everything is still in a familiar place, same as it was in 95. No silly rearranged menus or control panels.

You don't have to rent 98 like you rent XP.

Erm. Where's the advantage of XP again?

[Suicide Junkie]

Another "great" comparison based on observations tonight:
SJ's laptop:
166Mhz, 48 megs of ram, win 98.

SJ's sister's laptop:
1.5 Ghz, 512megs of ram, winXP.

---

Q) Which runs faster?
A) Neither. It was a trick question: they both have about the same speed and responsiveness.

[El_Phil]

I only went up to XP because some programmes flatly refused to run on 98/ME, or ran awfully. I got Dawn of War which had a developer admited 'feature' that it ran awfully on 98/ME as the memory management was optimised for XP.

That aside I wouldn't of bothered, I'm still not convinced myself.

Oh and Thermy that's a bad argument, as you well know. Different people can invent the same thing, I agree it happened slightly faster because DoD released it but something similar (or perhaps better http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif) with a couple of years. Lots of people were working in the field, inventors do exist outside of the US you know. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[Thermodyne]

Sivran said:
Security.

Take a 9x machine.
Install TCP.
Connect to Net.

Take a XP SP1 machine.
Install TCP.
Connect to Net.

Which box gets rooted?
That's right--the XP box.

Why?
Exploitable services exposed to the net.

Now put the two in the soft and gooey interior of a LAN. They'll both get 0wned. Why? File sharing was installed, of course, and being on the "protected" interior of the LAN, they don't have any workstation-level protection installed and thus fall to the next worm that gets through the LAN's eggshell exterior.

But Sivran, Microsoft issued a patch!
Ah, but patches, after the arduous Microsoft testing cycle, must also face the corporate testing cycle, delaying implementation perhaps long enough for the network to get 0wned.

Games.

Take an old game. Let's say Descent, or Descent II. Install on 98. Game runs. Joystick may be a hassle depending on model, but game runs. Install on XP. Game does not run. Compatability mode isn't.

"Up"grading.

In all seriousness, why should someone downgrade from 98SE to XP? What benefits do they get, that they cannot also get from 2k if they seriously need it?

They will still face the same spyware threats. They will still face the same browser exploit threats. They will still face email-borne virus threats.

They will not face the worm-without-user-intervention threats--9x is not susceptible at all unless file and print sharing is exposed. XP is susceptible, even if file and print sharing isn't even there.

Software still runs on 9x. 9x can be quite stable--the trick, I find, is simply not using IE, and avoiding memory and resource-leaking programs like some ancient versions of ZoneAlarm.

Multimedia still plays on 9x. Just need the codecs.

Everything is still in a familiar place, same as it was in 95. No silly rearranged menus or control panels.

You don't have to rent 98 like you rent XP.

Erm. Where's the advantage of XP again?



Hey Sirvan, see post above, Buy a book, take a class, hire a pro. Because you don’t have a clue. First off, 9x can be exploited by anyone who can touch the machine. And any second year computer tech student that can touch it on the net. Second you should be securing XP before you expose it to the net. Third, you should have a hardware firewall between you and any high speed WAN. Fourth, LAN systems are secured with GP and are tightly locked down, unless the LAN manager needs to see post above also. Fifth, you get what you pay for. If you buy a single stand alone license, you can install XP on any single system you want, one at a time just like 98. The copy that comes preinstalled on the Compaq from CompUSA is a discounted OEM install, and not transferable. Read the fine print before you buy! Sixth, as to the 9X games you love, ever hear of dual booting?


PS: Here’s your sign.

[Thermodyne]

El_Phil said:

Oh and Thermy that's a bad argument, as you well know. Different people can invent the same thing, I agree it happened slightly faster because DoD released it but something similar (or perhaps better http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif) with a couple of years. Lots of people were working in the field, inventors do exist outside of the US you know. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif



Do you have any idea of the money that was spent to develop TCP/IP? Or how many people worked on it? Only the US or USSR could have done it during that period in time. There are very few people in the world that know everything about what it can do and how it does it. Most people don’t have a clue. How many of you know what is taking place at each of the layers, or what the layers are? I’m not trying to say that Americans are smarter than the rest of the world, and I’m sure that there were foreign nationals that contributed to the project. What I’m saying is the US had the technical foresight and the economic strength to develop it even though the original use was just to connect dissimilar DOD systems on a RWAN, and to insure reliable data transmission. As to having the same idea at the same time, smartest and best funded person usually wins the race. There are 100’s of network protocols, but none have been able to displace TCP/IP. It has just been too robust, too adaptable, and too deployed for any one to give it any kind of a challenge.

[El_Phil]

Sure we wouldn't be where we are today without the money chucked at it (of course as a defence project it could have been done far cheaper by almost anyone else. This isn't a dig at US defence contractors, it's a dig at the Worlds defence projects. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif))

I would definetly dispute the technical foresight part. It was a task specific job, nobody involved was planning for any big public use. Oh sure maybe the odd one or two lower down, but I'd bet none of the money men.

A final point, the best technical system regularly loses. Everything from Betamax and Minidisc through to hardware standards and fighter jets (TSR-2 **sob**). Marketing and politics normally determines it.

In this case as TCP/IP was used by the millitary and universites it had an unmatchable deployed base and couldn't lose.

Much like Windows actually. It doesn't matter what the future versions are like, the installed base is so high developers only work on the MS version (others if they have time, which they normally don't) and it's up to bodges and fixes to get programmes to work on other platforms.

[Thermodyne]

TSR-2, been a while since I heard anyone mention that plane. With the advantage of hind sight, it’d probably best that it wasn’t built. By the time it would have entered service, speed was no longer a viable defense, and it was slow by the standards of the day. Lots of countries were caught in more or less the same position at that time. Here, the B58’s were much more advanced, but found to be too expensive to maintain. They were pulled from service after a very short service life. And the B70 was probably 2 generations more advanced, but never saw production partly because of survivability and cost of operation issues. The plane that did fit the specs came a little later, but was not well received. The US fielded a few F111’s and Australia bought a few. England had already purchased F4’s by then, and screwed that up by replacing the engines with units of lower performance. And if ever there was a plane that needed all of the raw power it could get, it was the Phantom II. Then SAC bought a few FB111’s, longer range higher bomb load F111’s, as a stopgap until the B1 rolled out. But then we screwed that up by first delaying the B1 and then scrapping the high speed low altitude intake system which castrated the engine performance.

Another plane that fit the specs and was flying at the time was the A5 Vigilante, but the Navy also found the cost of operation to be more that they could stand. I guess it’s a good thing that Boeing and Avro built some damn good bombers, since their designs have both out lived several generations of replacements. The plane that the TSR-2 was going to replace also lived on for quite a few years. The US built high altitude versions of the Canberra were almost the state of the art for high altitude recon work, second only the U2’s and a hell of a lot easier to fly.

[El_Phil]

Well the RR engine was far better, as always http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif, than any of the ****e GE and Pratt and Whitley tried to call jet engines. The problem was that the F-4 was a brick and bodging a decent engine into it was doomed, especially as it was done on a tight budget.

To quote the designer:
"All modern aircraft have four dimensions: span, length, height and politics. TSR-2 simply got the first three right."

Now maybe I'm crazy, but I do think that supercruise, Mach 2.5+ sprint is far faster than anything else out there. Especially the B-1B.

This, along with virtually everthing any Labour goverment has ever done, is reason enough for the entire lot to be put up against a wall and shot. And their parents just to be sure. Bitter and twister? Damn right! The systematic destruction of most of the UKs heavy industry and f**king the country over totally whenever they were let into power is all the reason I need to have them all killed.

[Fyron]

Thermodyne, please do not quote huge posts in the future. Ellipses work miracles.

[Atrocities]

Man that was a read!

[Renegade 13]

There are unfortunately many examples of great aircraft that were scrapped due to politics.

A classic example is the Avro Arrow (CF-105). In the '50's, Canada commissioned the creation of a new fighter-interceptor to counter the threat of new Soviet long-range bombers. It was feared the Soviets would send their bombers the short way to North America, over the North Pole. These fighters were designed to intercept, and destroy the bombers before they reached inhabited areas.

In 1958 after 4 years of production, the first Arrow was completed. However, shortly thereafter, the current government was voted out. The new government, for some inexplicable reason, killed the project, even after a few prototypes had been constructed. All prototypes, blueprints, everything the gov't could get their hands on was destroyed. If the Arrow was allowed to enter service in the Canadian Airforce, they'd in some ways be more advanced than the aircraft of the Canadian military today.

I've left a lot out of the story, but it was simply tragic what happened to the project, if you are familiar with it's history.

If you're curious about the aviation "firsts" that the Avro Arrow incorporated, take a look at This List (http://www.avroarrow.org/AvroArrow/arrowfirsts.html) , it shows the many innovations the Arrow had (remember the year was 1958!)

Some more interesting info on thrust:weight ratios:


At a combined 60,000-Ib thrust for an approximate 60,000-Ib aircraft, the Iroquois would have provided a 1:1 thrust to weight ratio. This would have given the Arrow a better than Mach 2 speed and perhaps Mach 3, limitations due to structural heating, not lack of power.



Another webpage with historical, political, and technical information (http://www.avroarrow.org/AvroArrow/factualarrow.html)

[El_Phil]

Wouldn't have been as fast the Lightning :p And that was a design prototype not the production model.

Still the Lightning was an achingly fast plane, by any standards. Some of the stuff that plane did was ridiculous, for a plane designed in 1954 to climb, out speed and out accelerate every other NATO fighter for most of its career.

[Thermodyne]

Again, hind sight would tell us that it was the correct way to go. None of the Mach 3 fighters were built, and as it turned out, they were not needed. At about the same time, the US canceled the F107 and F108 fighter programs. And results of later designs like the SR 71 suggest that the original Mach 3 designs would have never have been completely successful because of unforeseen engineering problems. Also, the two questions that remains unasked and unanswered are how would it have been paid for and where would the titanium have come from. To build the SR 71, the US ran one of the largest ruses in history. The titanium for obtained from the USSR for the alleged purpose of manufacturing paint. Companies were set up all across the third world and the titanium was then diverted to the US. The F12 was also a victim of the titanium shortage, having to compete with the ballistic missile program as well as Gemini and Apollo which had the highest priorities. Only 1 YF12 was built, and the results of it flight testing have never been released.

[Sivran]

Rudeness does nothing to support your point.

Physical access leads to an exploited machine full stop. Operating system does not enter into it. Remotely, a patched 9x system might could be crashed, but you'll not be seeing it get rooted by the kiddies and worms running around. Anything more and again OS does not enter into it: the attacker was determined and, as any second year tech will tell you, a determined attacker is going to get in.

I do not advocate that businesses keep 98, much less choose 9x over 2000, however if they have existing 9x machines in low-risk areas performing tasks that won't be done any better on a newer OS, why should they bother with a newer OS? Don't fix what isn't broke, right?

As for end-users they probably have even more reason to stick with 9x if it is doing the job for them. Why should they bother with the hassle of switching? Again, they'll face the same dangers either way, assuming those dangers even apply, and 9x does the job. For what I do with my machines, 2000 does the job better and so that is what I use. 98SE however did the job quite respectably and crashed or required reboot almost as rarely as 2000 Server. The last 98 box in the house--tasked with playing movies to the TV in the living room on the weekends--suffers on rare occasions not because of the OS it's running, but because of the ancient video card. It doesn't crash, as most people seem to believe 98 is wont to do at the drop of a hat. It just sits there, providing internet access to that end of the house and providing entertainment (who needs media center? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif). It couldn't possibly do its job any better if it were running XP or 2000. In fact, given the hardware in it, it'd most likely perform worse.

Insulting and talking down to those who still use 9x--hell my granddad still uses ME and has no problems--only shows your own arrogance and ignorance.

Use the right OS for the right job. 9x is just fine, even superior, in some situations. There are those situations where it doesn't matter, and in still others, yes it is inferior. That's a choice for the user to make. I'm sorry you can't seem to accept that.

As to dual-booting, why have two operating systems when one does most or everything a user needs equally well or with negligible difference?

[Thermodyne]

Again you post half truths and outright misinformation. Your first post is dead wrong. Physical access to an XP/2K system does not give you instant access to its information, where as 98 will allow anyone to logon and browse at will. And while the skilled hacker can root out any system, the majority of hackers are not that skilled. Less than .1% has that skill set and the low moral values required to put the skills to that use. And even the skilled ones are often stopped by modern domain security these days. Another correction would be that there is no such thing a properly secured 98 system. There hasn’t been a new security patch in what….two years now? And 9x is wide open to TSR’s. I won’t even bother to go into NTFS permissions or Group Policy; I seriously doubt you would take the time to digest the information.

To your second point I agree. But they should not be connected to LAN’s where sensitive data is stored. A 9x system can be bott'd with a script or TSR and used to compromise every system on said LAN. I am not a big fan of upgrading the OS’s on enterprise systems. The demands of newer OS usually require upgrading older system hardware to run properly, and the money would be better spent on new systems.

To your third point, no one is saying that 98 can’t fill a roll, and we are certainly not saying that your systems don’t serve you well, how would we know one way or the other. But, the average user will get a new OS when he replaces his equipment, 98 is obsolete and no longer licensed as preinstalled software on new systems. At no point have I spoken to the serviceability of your personal systems, I fail to see why you feel the need to defend them. But then perhaps you have good reasons that are unknown to us.

To your fourth point, I stand by my statement. Based on your first post, you don’t know what you are talking about, and it contains outright untruthful statements. And I fail to see why you brought your grand father into the discussion; it has no bearing what so ever in this exchange.

As to your point of using 98 in the right situations, that is true. But the situations are few. As a rig to run 9x series games on yes, because of economic constraints yes. But that is about it. And you’ll have to show me where I posted that I can’t accept people choosing to run 9x, I don’t recall saying that. To me it seems to be another untruth, this time veiled as if it was a statement I made. With the exception of 9x games or old down-level hardware, 9x is not superior.

And your last point makes little since. If you are keeping a 9x system just to run non NT compatible software, why keep a second system going? Unless of course there is another reason such as a user who relies on that system. I actually take it a step further by running more than on OS simultaneously. I don’t often advise this to others, as the hardware demands are more than the average system can provide.

My point is this, when looked at as a whole, XP is better than 2K or 9x. 2K can be adapted to standards that approach XP, but 9x can not. Longhorn will be better across the board than XP. But that does not mean that everyone should run out and buy it. I do object to people who have never used it crapping on it just because they think it’s cool to jump on the bandwagon and crap on anything new from MS. I will be glad to continue to debate the issue with you, but lets get more specific and leave grand parent and such out of it. Also, as of now, my opinion still stands, so here’s your sign.

[Fyron]

Thermodyne, you seem overly concerned with people hating Microsoft because it is trendy to hate it or because it is successful or whatever. This is blatantly opposite from reality for probably everybody that has posted in this thread. There are billions of valid reasons to hate Microsoft, none of which have anything to do with success or popularity.

Also, note that physical access to a machine guarantees compromise, period. It doesn't matter what is run on the machine, it will be compromised if the cracker means to compromise it. Noone said anything about "instant access." Guaranteed compromise has absolutely nothing to do with instantaneous access.

[Thermodyne]

People can hate anything they want, but they should be able to support their position.

As to access guaranteeing a compromise, I would have to argue that with you. But to keep this simple, why don’t you tell me how you would gain access to the data, then I tell you why it won’t work. And you get six tries, after that there is no data to get unless you are going to use some forensic recovery method. And for that you’ll have to remove the system which is beyond the scope of access.

[El_Phil]

Thermodyne said:
Again, hind sight would tell us that it was the correct way to go. None of the Mach 3 fighters were built, and as it turned out, they were not needed. At about the same time, the US canceled the F107 and F108 fighter programs. And results of later designs like the SR 71 suggest that the original Mach 3 designs would have never have been completely successful because of unforeseen engineering problems.



First off TSR-2 was aviation grade ally-copper alloy, not titanium. No problem there.

As for the costs, you've paid the development costs, so the choice for TSR-2 was, build it or go F-111. As it turned out F-111 had cost overruns, indeed massive cost overruns, so the UK pulled out and brought some F-4s. For the money spunked on F-111 and buying F-4s you could of built as many TSR-2s as you wanted.

The money was there for new planes. I know you can get a bit 'US is best' blinded Thermy, but are you seriously saying you'd take F-4s over TSR-2s?

[Sivran]

Again, resorting to insults does not support your argument. And you're doing it in every post: calling 9x users stupid and clueless. You've shown me--and anyone else who disagress with you--nothing but contempt and hostility. I can only conclude that it's just something you do to make you feel better about yourself, and hope that you don't carry over this hostility to your workplace.

An attacker getting his hands physically on a machine is the worst possible thing that could happen to any machine regardless of the OS. It WILL be compromised. Yes, time taken will vary, but it will not remain secure, full stop. This is why we have physical security measures as well as software.

To me it sounds like you believe in 100% security. You make it sound as if you believe XP in the enterprise is nigh invincible. I hope it isn't true, but your post sure sounds like it.

I am not a mindless MS basher. I think they have made some fundamental mistakes. Their patching is slow but I understand why it is and I don't fault them for it. Personally, I hate XP, it's only made life harder for me. I applaud Microsoft's recent efforts in the security arena. You on the other hand come across the same way as those rabid Firefox fans.

My point is, 98 and ME are still viable operating systems and should not be discounted simply because they do not contain the kitchen sink, nor should their users be subject to the flames you so enjoy spewing and the signs you dearly love. As to your opinion, well, we know what those are like.

[NullAshton]

ME is not a viable operating system, as it crashes every chance you get. It mananged to crash as it was connecting to the internet. How the heck does it manage that?

[Fyron]

Thermodyne said:
People can hate anything they want, but they should be able to support their position.

And they do. All the time. You just choose to read it how you want to and add lots of personal attacks and insults so that your own worldview will not be threatened. There is no reason for calling us idiots and other such things. Learn to respond without the insults, or agree to disagree. Please stop posting in this thread if you can not do so without the flames. Thank you.

And Sivran, that was cutting it rather close as well.

Let's try to be civil here...

=0=

I never said I had the skills to compromise a computer that I had physical access to. But there are many that do. Physical security is by far the most important layer of security.

=0=

NullAshton said:
ME is not a viable operating system, as it crashes every chance you get.

ME can be perfectly stable, if you avoid installing 16 bit programs and drivers. More difficult to achieve than with 98, but definitely within the realm of the possible. Also, IE should be avoided on it just like on 95 and 98.

[Thermodyne]

EDIT: Stupid post removed

[Thermodyne]

Whoa there fella, I don’t recall insulting anyone but Sivran. And that was only do to his original post were he stated that 98 was more secure than 2K/XP. Personally, I think that that type of misinformation should be discredited by the most direct and harshest means available. 9x compromises don’t make the news; so many uninformed people assume that it is safe. Also, the deployed base is not really a high value target these days. With worms getting all the press, it has been forgotten that TSR’s were the favored attack against 9x. And with a TSR, you can achieve the same end result as a worm has on XP.

Most people think that with access they can use a program to reset the administrator account password or that the can boot to another OS and access the file system. This is not true today. It would probably still work on a home system, but not on a secure network. The biggest problem today is biological compromise such as users writing down their username and password on a post it and then sticking it to the monitor or keyboard. This and HIPPA are probably going to force us to move to a biometric form of authentication. Data interception is another area that is vulnerable, that’s why you see wire mesh on the outsides of some government buildings and super sensitive sites have no offices with exterior wall exposure.

[Renegade 13]

One thing that should never be talked about on a public forum:

OS's

[Fyron]

It doesn't matter if it was one person. Flames are _never_ the way to respond to anything you disagree with. Also, it should be noted that Sivran is far more than your "average user."

[Thermodyne]

Sivran, again you have me saying things that I never said. In the future please include quotes if you choose to put words in my mouth. Secondly, you don’t have a clue as to who I am or what I am like. From your post, I would have to assume that you are now speaking for everyone else. Wouldn’t that be a bit of a reach? In your first post, you clearly indicated that 98 was less vulnerable than XP/2K. And I choose to continue to state that this is not true. And since you have chosen to fall back on the defense of your personal honor, rather than post facts to support your position, I can only assume that you have none to post. Also, why do you continue to defend yourself on points that are not part of the discussion that you and I are having. This whole thing is about your statement, by example, that 98 is more secure than XP. So unless you intend to support your statement, just let it drop. But if you choose to continue, I’ll reply to every post and bring the topic back to your opening statement until such time as you choose to address it. I can respect anyone’s opinion if it is based in fact. I can even respect a person that is willing to make a good argument of their position when it is based on opinion. But you have yet to do either. Saying that your grand dad still uses 98 does not support your position, even though I would assume that he is a fine gentleman. You don’t have to agree with me, but you should at least have the nards to support your position with fact, or bow out. Hell, it’s no shame to have a position that is based only on your experience with the subject at hand, but you should include that with the statement. So, if you choose to continue this, you might as well address the issue in question, or you will get very tired of me continuing to bring it up.

[Thermodyne]

Imperator Fyron said:
It doesn't matter if it was one person. Flames are _never_ the way to respond to anything you disagree with. Also, it should be noted that Sivran is far more than your "average user."



I know that, Ive seen him around some other forums I belong to. But the fact remains that the point of his first post is dead wrong, and something that shaould have never been posted by a user of his experiance.

[Suicide Junkie]

Thermodyne said:
In your first post, you clearly indicated that 98 was less vulnerable than XP/2K. And I choose to continue to state that this is not true.

It seemed pretty clear to me that he was talking about the two "out of the box".
XP was pretty famous for its RPC exploits, and the "joy" of going online to get updates to protect you from online stuff.

[El_Phil]

Thermodyne said:
Blather here.




That was quite the most confused post I've ever seen, I wasn't entirely sure which aircraft you were talking about. Several in one confused mess I think. But frankly as it ranged across several topics I don't actually know.

Here's what I think your saying. Because the US had problems with high speed planes, everyone else would have. So the British govement should have spent the money defending US cities. I know you are US centric, but I hope that is a mistake.

Anyway TSR-2 wasn't an interceptor. Hence the name "Tactical Strike and Reconnisance". Notice the absence of any interceptor term. I agree calling it an interceptor makes it easier to trash, but it isn't one. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Given that nobody wanted TSR-2 interceptor and the F-4s weren't used as interceptors quite where you got that idea from I have no idea.

[Xrati]

Man, this thread is like going to a fight (Vista) and a hockey game (aircraft) breaks out! Everybody has their own opinions on just about everything, that's why we come here, TO SHARE THEM. In the end you will still form an opinion and probably logoff continuing to believe it! Life goes on.

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smile.gif Quote: ( Forest Gump " It Happens"

[El_Phil]

Well as our other topics go off on wild tangents with regular topic changes, why shouldn't this one?

You do learn something but, as you say, rarely change an opinion. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[Thermodyne]

Argg………Sorry, I transposed the TSR-2 with the CF-105, so the post makes no cense at all. My bad and I apologize.

[ToddT]

Vista Features, well its been about week or since i ran across this bit so momory is vague. Vista has a feature Called "Chimney" its ome kind of network performance ehancement Feature integrated into the OS and it does as advertised, Given that MS looking at a pending injuction of the sale of Vista for the stolen software. They ripped off a compnay they had been dealing with for 2 years claiming they where no longer interested in the product.MS settled pretty quick so the that new feature is still in there. I wish i remebered the name company in question, because that would make a search for that case easy.
Guess that one was also not signed off on by the lawyers, among others.

here are the links to the 2 articles:
http://www.tomshardware.com/hardnews/20050413_201313.html
http://www.tomshardware.com/hardnews/20050713_182601.html

oh theres another case that MS lost along similir lines.
MS's defense the copying was being done out side the US so now infringement was occuring AT&T was the victim.
Yes Vista may be better than XP but it still has its pit falls.

[Suicide Junkie]

What's with all the links to this tom's hardware lately?
The pages are nothing but 2 or 3 sentences, plus a link to the REAL article on a different site. And all surrounded by ads... Ugh. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[Xrati]

So what your saying is that if I install Vista on my computer and run an anti-virus program, it may just remove Vista? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif
I'm waiting for the follow up to Vista, "Gates 13.0" the first few versions weren't exactly right!

[PvK]

Vista/Longhorn seems highly evil to me. M$ intends to continue leveraging its monopoly to get people subscribing and paying them regularly for the priviledge of using their latest bloatware, which in turn will do its best to deny them the right to copy data freely and privately.

XP is already worse than bad enough for my tastes.

I use Win98SE at home because I already have licenses for it, it doesn't insist I register or activate it nor monitor my hardware changes to see if it should force me to re-activate it. I find Win98SE to be clean and lightweight and stable (when I control the machine, as opposed to what can happen from installing tons of crap and stuff from the web, etc), and it runs practically every program I really want.

I like Win2K Client too and also use it. Win2003 Client I find far less annoying than XP.

I'm liking my Linux machines more and more, though.

PvK