Linked by Adam S on Wed 25th Sep 2002 02:21 UTC
The Linux community has been buzzing about LindowsOS since its original announcement over a year ago. With Michael Robertson, founder of mp3.com, at the helm, it was heralded as a Linux that could seamlessly run all of your Windows applications. As details became available, the skepticism of the community grew and with the LindowsOS general release only months away, no one is quite sure what to make of Lindows.com and their product, LindowsOS. We tested Lindows 2.0 and we today present the most in-depth review ever written for this much-talked OS, accompanied by a number of shots.
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jbolden1517 says: If you care about security that much why advocate an operating system in which security was an after thought? For a true desktop system that doesn't have servers installed breaking security is fairly hard. There is no FTP, no telnet, no sshd, no sendmail... Maybe you can take over the box by convincing the user to download some software; but then you could take over any unix box the same way. The only operating systems that will hold up against tricking the administrator are the ones running capability systems like the above.
I have no issue with most of the compromises they make to make the system more usable to the average user. The problem is, the reason people will move to Lindows from Windows is to get away from the rampant problems that MS has, with crashing and with security. Why switch to Lindows at all if Lindows dumbs itself down enough that it's just as susceptible to problems? It'll still be a bit more stable, but 2000 or XP with good hardware (and trusted drivers) is stable enough. On UNIX systems, *even if* they trick the user into doing something, it can only mess up their sandbox.
First off I think Lindows is going to be going after the under $500 market that commodore used to own where stability is not much of an issue. At this point I'm not sure that a Linux desktop is any more stable than a windows desktop or a linux server much more stable than a windows one. The biggest difference would be ease of repair in case of moderate damage. Things like Exchange can go down very very hard.
As for damaging the sandbox only. That's not true. Virtually any Linux is toast once you have even user level access to the system. Very few Unixes (and no Linuxes to the best of my knowledge) can hold up long against a hostile insider. You have way too many systems on a Unix that are Turing complete, suid to a highly privledged user, and provide access to all users.