Comments on: Windows update

By: David Gerard

David Gerard — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 18:00:44 +0000

What amazes me is that Wine is actually more compatible with your obscure Windows crapware than Windows Vista is. And it’s the obscure Windows crapware - the one five-year-old app they utterly rely on for which you can’t find the programmer or company at all, let alone convince them to open it - which keeps people stuck on Windows. I’m more surprised these days when Wine doesn’t work than when it does.

By: nixternal

nixternal — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 15:45:37 +0000

Did this fix the Windows XP security problem though? I know it fixed Vista, but I thought XP still had the problem. According to the system administrators here at the university the issue still exists with the 25,000+ XP SP2 machines. Then again they are typical sys admins so I take what they say with a grain of salt anyways.

Security first is a bad ideal to carry. It should be user first. If you put the user first, security, functionality and quality will fall into place. You don’t release a patch that breaks stuff. I know Ubuntu did it a few months back and it broke X, granted that is larger than the sound panel issue, but still there were a lot of upset individuals. Test, test it again, have other test it, then test it some more before you release it to your most important business asset, the customer, in this case the end-user. Microsoft has been hounding their new QA and security teams, and yet they still release the patch. I know the teams are young in their invention with Microsoft, but that really isn’t an excuse. I don’t care what OS you use, before they release a fix to anything 1) make sure it fixes the problem, and 2) make sure it doesn’t create others.

By: Rob J. Caskey

Rob J. Caskey — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 13:47:15 +0000

I’m with Redmond on this one, security first. Fix the security problem now, worry about the rest. I got that warning, and yes it was “scary,” but mom & pop benefit from this stuff.

By: nixternal

nixternal — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 13:06:52 +0000

I would have to go with the latter of course in this one, however showing off the continues “spotlighted” flaws is about the only marketing going on in the Linux world. Everything from MSNBC to CNN, they have been “spotlighting” the Vista flaws here almost on a daily basis during them tech talks, and they keep bringing up Linux as the alternate choice.

Until some great person comes along and creates a marketing plan for Linux, I am affraid that proving that Microsoft is crap (which they do well on their own), and that Linux is better, is about the only marketing out there for Linux. Linux has never been marketed well, and if the community wants it to be mainstream, well maybe it is time they get some marketing giants on board, otherwise Linux will continue being that operating system for hackers and the hardcore, which we all know is not true.

By: daniels

daniels — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 12:41:42 +0000

No better way to promote it than by showing off the continuous flaws in Microsoft.

What’s better? ‘Use Linux because Windows is crap’, or ‘use Linux because it’s good’?

By: nixternal

nixternal — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 12:37:36 +0000

I wouldn’t have even said GnuCash for consumer grade. Microsoft Money is far from commercial-grade, it is only consumer-grade last I checked. Quickbooks and Peachtree are your 2 commercial-grade apps, and actually there is Oracle, not all that open-source, however it is available for *nix boxes. Quickbooks and Peachtree are the 2 most popular accounting apps for a small business. They are rather crude, however they do the job for the small business. For accounting, I always recommend Oracles T&E modules. It does everything you can think of and then some. It even ties in with your SAP/ERP systems. So there really is a commercial-grade accounting solution, just not a very good consumer-grade version to battle Quicken or Microsoft Money. KMyMoney is OK, but I have had nothing but issues trying to import my account shit.