Re: Windows vs. Linux

July 25th, 2005 • Linux

This might be a little late, given the original article‘s date. I don’t really remember where I found this link, but that shouldn’t matter anyway.

Let me cut this short. Turns out that Windows is better than Linux because you need to buy software to “ensure” its security! This is stupidity at its finest.

• Windows versus Linux on the Server

  Most of my friends and family use Windows 2000, but to power my business network I need the robust features and rock-solid stability of Windows Advanced Server 2003. Windows Advanced Server lets me establish and administer global networks consisting of thousands of clients across hundreds of domains, all with a single wizard. And since all of my buddies at work use Windows Media Player 9 to rip, mix and burn CDs that we can’t share with each other or play in the car, we are extremely excited about the Windows Media Player 10 beta that comes integrated with Advanced Server 2003. Now we can rip, mix and burn right on the server! Try getting a streaming video, DVD, CD, MP3, wma, and active content player all tightly integrated into a Linux server. Not likely!

  Here’s the thing. If you’re only using Microsoft Windows Advanced Server 2003 to rip, mix and burn CDs, I can’t help but say: “What a waste!”. I thought that Microsoft Windows Advanced Server 2003 was designed for much more advanced “servering”, like servering web, mail and DNS. To be honest, Microsoft Windows Advanced Server 2003 is a pretty solid product, it’s very stable, it’s probably fast enough, but try to put to a 100,000 connections per second, I’d think it’ll fail.

  In case you’re interested though, VLC can do just that for you, it can stream almost any video format without DRM crap. Let’s see in a couple of years from now how you can Microsoft Windows Advanced Vista Server 2005 to rip, mix and burn CDs that you want to play in the car.

• Windows versus Linux on the Home PC

  I’m running XP on the monster rig I use at home–a brand new Compaq mid-tower–and the OS blazes like a Corvette. I especially like the four games it comes with – Hearts, FreeCell (so addictive!), Minesweeper, and Solitaire. It’s easy to see why XP is considered the ultimate platform for gamers.

  Oh, so it was FreeCell, huh? Silly me, I spent nights and days trying to figure out what exactly made EA create their games for Windows, it wasn’t the monopoly-like status of Windows, right? Or that all the latest video drivers were released exclusively for Windows.

  One thing many home computer users are concerned with these days is viruses and all the time they consume. Linux zealots will try to say that their platform isn’t plagued by things like email viruses, but with Windows XP I don’t gotta worry about emailing viruses to my friends and family at all. The built-in email client Outlook Express does it automatically, in the background. (emphasis mine)

  Excuse me? I beg you to reread the last sentence: With Windows XP you don’t gotta worry about emailing viruses because Outlook Express does that for you? Better yet, it does it in the background. Hmmm.

  Enough word-play though. If you have to compare, try comparing Outlook to KDE’s Kontact or GNOME’s Evolution, there’s a real challenge. I have to admit, Outlook looks very sexy, but I remember having to reinstall Outlook about a dozen of times on my father’s PC just to get his archives back. Well that only lasted until I got him covered with Thunderbird. Now all you have to do is whisper “Outlook” three times in front of him to manage you’re own suicide.

• Windows versus Linux – Applications and Utilities

  I save a lot of time thanks to Windows XP, which brings me to another area where Linux is lacking. As I am sitting here writing this column, my computer is busily defragging my hard drive, running my virus scanner, and I’m being shown a list of all the latest MS security patches that are being remotely installed on my machine today. Why doesn’t Linux come with any defragmenting tools or virus scanners or Active Backdoor Update like you get with Windows?

  How about: “Because you don’t need those.”? With ext3 and ReiserFS you can forget about defragmenting, because fragmentation simply doesn’t happen, and the only reason you’d install an anti-virus on Linux is to scan the rest of your poor network running Windows machines.

  Most Linux distributions come with an office suite, a couple of email clients and a dozen of media players. Granted, not all of them is comparable to their Windows equivalent, but most of them are pretty much the same. Did I mention those were free? Remind me, how much does Microsoft Office cost? $100? $200? How is that better than $0?

  For those who’re interested, if you really need an active update facility, SuSE has it built-in, Debian can run a background daemon, Gentoo can do that too, RedHat has up2date, and Fedora has yum. I hope I got you covered.

• Windows versus Linux – Preference Tracking and Calling Home

  Who wants to use an operating system that doesn’t learn about you, that doesn’t keep track of what you like to look at on the web, listen to, or watch? With Windows XP Home, I have the peace of mind that comes with knowing my habits and activities are being monitored by Microsoft, and my computer’s hardware configuration and list of installed software is being stored in a database in Redmond. Windows Longhorn will go even further than XP in this regard, as it won’t even run any programs or code that hasn’t been registered and approved by Microsoft. Goodbye, Kazaa, WinMX, Limewire, Piolet, your infringing days are numbered! Windows Longhorn will be like having a little cop right inside your computer, something MCSEs such as myself have been demanding for years. Let me just say, it’s about f’ing time!

  I don’t even know where to begin to reply to this non-sense. You actually want a product that actively monitors what you do?! How about a few IP cameras with public IPs published all over the Web? I just don’t get it. What more do you want than a system that gives you absolute freedom, lets you do whatever the heck you want with it, and better yet, doesn’t rip you off for your minimum rights. MCSEs like this guy are a shame to computer science.

• Windows versus Linux – Intellectual Property and The Law

  Can any of them prove that Linux is NOT illegally derived from Unix System V? If so I haven’t seen it. Once this case goes to court in 2005, and IBM loses, Linux users will owe SCO $650 *per seat* for Linux deployments. This is far more expensive than Windows.

  To be fair, I can’t really argue IP issues, I’m not a lawyer, but it seems to me that Linux is even more secure legally than Windows. The fact that nobody owns Linux enough to reassure you. If Linus and the rest of the crew die this very moment, you can be sure that there will be someone else to pick up from there, without any legal liability. Even if SCO was able to prove that they owned a part of Linux code, then all Linux developers had to do is to replace the code in question and get on with it, no license-per-seat, no license-per-connection, no kidding.

  Correct me if I’m wrong, but if somebody had the finances to sue Microsoft over patent infringement, wouldn’t that wake up any sleeping MCSE administrator?

  What many MCSEs like this guy misunderstand is that Linux isn’t about zero-price, it’s about freedom, security, and a few other concepts that you might not be familiar with in a Windows world.

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