IP Cops to target Linux end-users?

SCO.com ^ | May 12, 2003 | Darl McBride

[Windcatcher]

I bought Lycoris Desktop/LX (developer version) for $40. You can get the consumer version for $30 (if you want support), or you could download it for free.

OpenOffice.org: FREE
Mozilla: FREE
CodeWeavers Crossover Office: $50. buy it ONLY if you NEED MS Office or certain Windows apps.

It depends on what you want the computer for. From experience, Lycoris is good enough that my father could probably use it with only an hour's worth of handholding or so.

[TechJunkYard]

IBM has contributed lots of code to the kernel hackers, for both s/390 and Intel flavors. Everyone at IBM who touches open source code has received extensive training on the GPL and the various Unix licenses.

With all of the lawyers and management oversight entrenched throughout IBM, you'd better believe they would not be associated with Linux if they saw any liability whatsoever.

[supercat]

This has happened with mp3 files, some gif files and now Linux. This is fraud, and the courts should not allow it.

Indeed, in many of these cases I think it can be shown that the "owners" of these materials deliberately delayed giving any notice of suspected infringement for the purpose of allowing their materials to become highly-entrenched standards.

[Stillwillin]

Codeweavers also offers a module called Crossover Plugin.~$25.
CrossOver allows you to execute Windows web browser plug-ins in Linux.Highly recommended.

[Malsua]

Windows XP is great.

Sure if you don't mind random reboots, security holes, sluggish performance, Big Brother monitoring, enriching a monopoly, poor backward compatibility, fussy hardware requirements and vanishing user controls.

I have fully patched XP Service Pack 1 on about 20 machines at work. None have crashed yet, not once. I know it when a computer crashes because it holds up production. This is in a manufacturing environment with 24/7 up time and no reboots because operators work 8-10 hours and leave. Some of these machines may get rebooted once every couple of months mostly becuase we patched them.

About the monitoring. Get this tool:

XPAntispy

Not sure about backward compat, but then again, I'm only using stuff written for 95 or later. Printer drivers and such are an issue, that's true. Fussy hardware? 128mbs of ram, but otherwise, I've put it on some PII-233s and it works first time.

Not sure what you mean about the controls, but there are two things you need to do when you sit down to a fresh install of XP.

Set the theme to "windows classic" and set the start menu to "Classic Start Menu". At that point it's almost virtually identical to 2000.

It's not sluggish and I use both 2000 and XP every day. I write code on my XP machine and install the EXE on 98, 2000, and other XP machines. No fuss no muss.

One thing it does best is East Asian Language support. The IME in 2000 is close but it's perfected in XP. Since my machines have to support Japanese Shift JIS data natively, I had to go to English XP because running Japanese NT/2000/XP is a nightmare when you don't speak a word of it and you get error messages. This was a major headache for me to support. XP made the problem go away!

Front of the house, XP all the way. Back of the house, I wouldn't support it for a second. Your favorite Linux/Unix varient is much better suited to the tasks and can handle massive loads without crashing. Our 2000 servers don't crash, but they tend to get rebooted and patched frequently. Our Suns tend run months on end with nary a tech sitting down at it to do something short of backups.

I sorta despise the draconian muscle Gates brings to bear, but XP is a nice OS for end users.

[Clara Lou]

You can download Linux without any cost. Or you can buy it on CD.

[gore3000]

You can download Linux without any cost. Or you can buy it on CD.

I have been using it for over a year and I love it.

[gore3000]

Probably the biggest threat to MS is IBM pushing Linux on an equal footing with Windows.

Yup, IBM gives Linux what many big companies say they need to take it seriously - a company that will service it for them.

[klute]

Haha. There are more things than just CPU power. Believe me, I have lots of things running on Sun that I would not trust on the windows machines crashing around me. Free your mind. Get the big picture.