“Microsoft may not be ready to announce its own Linux distribution, but it does sell a product with appeal for POSIX fans: Windows Services for Unix 3.0. Designed as a migration tool to assist organizations moving from Unix to Windows, SFU is also useful for organizations that need to live with both Unix and Windows.” Read the review at NewsForge. OSNews’ review is here.
Review: Windows Services for Unix 3.0
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
Certainly better than the one here a little bit ago – at least this one mentioned the AD/NIS integration which is an amazing feature, and a bit about NFS – but still no mention of kerberos realms, etc. At least the article did point out some of the shortcomings as well.
I’ll give it 3/5 stars.
“I found the lack of the bash shell personally frustrating. Bash comes preconfigured for command line editing using the arrow keys and command completion using the Tab key. The Korn shell feels old-fashioned to me without these attributes, but I expect some Korn shell devotees will feel at home.
For remote access, SFU includes telnet, rsh, and ftp commands. This strikes me as ironic, since most Linux distributions seem to be discouraging the use of telnet and rsh and pushing ssh instead. The SFU solution may not be exactly state of the art, but it does work…
…One thing that most Unix and Linux folks may miss is the presence of an X Window System server.”
All can be found right here…
http://www.interopsystems.com/tools/warehouse.htm
Note: Interop Systems is the official MSFT partner that they distribute SFU/Interix through, exclusively.
Why not just do their own unix server system????
Ah, finally the link is clear. I see why you are so amazingly pro-Microsoft.
You work for one of the energy companies that is dead set on raping the environment, including the Alaskan wilderness, instead of developing clean energy.
http://www.talisman-energy.com/index.html
No wonder you so blindly and loyally support Microsoft. They are your technology partner in creating a dying Earth that the NWO can rule. Perhaps they are even a shareholder in your company.
It is very interesting that virtually all the gung-ho pro-Microsoft people are devoid of morals and ethics. The computing world may be divided on the surface into “platforms”, but the real cause of the division is more profound.
People are split into those who have morals and ethics (Mac & GNU/Linux & alt. systems) and amoral evil neo-fascists (Microsoft).
It is important to understand what a person is supporting when they support Microsoft. Not just an OS and Office monopoly. But a hugely powerful global organization that is aligned with energy companies, defense companies, and governments to enslave the global population and establish an all-powerful global government. Microsoft has put more people in prison than any other tech company, all for societally meaningless license violations.
And that is why people who have a “sense” about things, avoid Microsoft. “It’s the smell.”
their software is nothing more than unix under a heavy guise. anyway. all of the services are unix derived.. the dns server is bind with a gui interface etc..
again if your planning to migrate.. why would you give up that million pound sun box which is just the don and stick in an x86 box..
and then why bother running this on a windows box when you can run linux or bsd on your x86 this service really makes not a lot of sense unless your stuck working on a shitty windows server.. then i guess it makes sense.. but in which case why not just stick in a debian cd or a redhat cd and wipe the crap and install a real os.
“Designed as a migration tool to assist organizations moving from Unix to Windows”
I wonder if they considered that this could also be used by organizations moving from Windows to Unix, Linux or MacOS X. Anyways, it’s good to see MS making good use of their SCO Unix license.
So Microsoft charges for a collection of tools, most of which are free, and VERY out of date. I mean, Korn Shell ’88, for crying out loud, when ksh93 has been freely available for over 3 years? GCC 2.0.7 ? That goes back to early ’92.
Okay, you can download updated stuff from Interop Systems but I don’t see why I should have to pay the world’s largest software company for 10 yr old tools and then spend time updating from a third party.
Way to go, M$ but I’ll stick with Cygwin.
Care to tell us all what corporate anti-christ you happen to be working for today, asshole, or do you just make your survival money out of thin-air I guess?
Yep, thin air. I currently work for a non-profit institute, though in the past I have worked for a number of leading personal computer software vendors.
I could not in good conscience work for a company that despoils the planet, makes enormous profits doing so, and returns almost none of those profits back to helping the world or helping the people that live on the world.
When someone supports Microsoft, they are making a personal statement which is basically:
I have no integrity
I don’t care about other people
I don’t want to make the world a better place
I don’t have morality or ethics
I like using my power to hurt others
This statement is pretty much the credo of Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft.
You can see the obvious parallels with the oil and gas industry.
You are nothing more than a sanctimonious little hypocrite of the worst kind, Michael. People like you go straight to Hell and I can’t wait to see the look on your face when you get there.
There is nothing more to say.
Saying people who care about the world and work to take care of it go “straight to Hell” is only the sad and empty rhetoric of a Neo Con.
Over time, your company has likely killed millions of people by polluting the planet, giving people cancer, asmtha, and other grievous ailments.
Not to mention its abuses of human rights:
http://www.socialfunds.com/news/article.cgi?sfArticleId=205
Note that it took years of effort and lawsuits to stop your company from funding human rights abuses in the Sudan. But not to worry. Your company is busy in Alaska and elsewhere, raping nature and hurting people for further profits.
And it seems the Canadian government had to force your company to adopt even a minimal code of ethics. That seems 100% in alignment with your fawning support of Microsoft and their lack of ethics.
So far the software industry has long a way to go before it matches the absymal ecological and human rights record of your company and other oil/gas companies.
I’m sure you and Bill get together for breakfast to laugh about who your respective companies have fucked over recently — all in the name of almighty greed.
You must think “Heaven” is a bank vault filled with money made from the ashes of all the people you’ve harmed and killed.
I dislike MS just as much as the next guy, but man…you’re a nut. Leave personal stuff out of places like this, they dont belong here. On a side note, it’s not the person who does all the best things that goes to heaven. Doing good things to go to heaven doesnt get you there.
I do actually *try* to keep personal things off of the forum. However, I do try and focus on ideals — individual freedoms, privacy, market choice, local economies, etc., — that don’t often get the attention they deserve.
If my zeal has crossed over too much into a personal space on the forum, I apologize. I see it’s made you uncomfortable. Not many people in America are comfortable anymore with being held responsible or accounting for anything, especially their opinions and thoughts. Part of the fear of a slave.
When it comes to Microsoft and their supporters, I am fiercely American, in the spirit of Dwight Eisenhower and the founders of America:
“Here in America we are descended in blood and in spirit from revolutionists and rebels – men and women who dare to dissent from accepted doctrine. As their heirs, may we never confuse honest dissent with disloyal subversion.” — D.E.
Today Gates had this to say:
“We’re proud to be involved in the effort to connect a significant portion of the federal homeland security community into a national information-sharing and intelligence-analysis network,” Gates said.
If for some reason you are against liberty and freedom, you can support all of Microsoft’s Orwellian plans for the future. I, for one, will dissent and resist Microsoft’s dystopian future as long as I am able.
“The corporate grip on opinion in the United States is one of the wonders of the Western world. No First World country has ever managed to eliminate so entirely from its media all objectivity – much less dissent.” — Gore Vidal
“We must dare to think ‘unthinkable’ thoughts. We must learn to explore all the options and possibilities that confront us in a complex and rapidly changing world. We must learn to welcome and not to fear the voices of dissent. We must dare to think about ‘unthinkable things’ because when things become unthinkable, thinking stops and action becomes mindless.” — James William Fulbright
You’re a retard.
Drive a car ? Stop killing the environment you insensitive fuck.
Ease off on the zealotism ?
It’s not a religion
You didn’t quite answer my question, actually. I would be interested in Googling or otherwise obtaining a list of the financial donators to this mysterious “non-profit institute” that you say you work for. How about giving us the name of it and the link to its website please? You were so eager to supply the same to everyone on behalf of myself, after all.
I am sure that with such an unimpeachible source of saintly integrity as yourself being involved that I will find absolutley no dubious or compromising support from the likes of, say, The Rockefeller Foundation, The Ford Foundation, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Exxon-Mobil, McDonnel-Douglas, etc., etc.? I am really curious to find out if you’re not just as much a “corporate whore” as you say I am. Only fair, don’t you think? Just where does your employer get their money, anyway?
Just because for the only time I’ve ever noticed, you didn’t use your anonymizer when posting and I saw your real world connection… doesn’t make this a comparison of you vs. me or where-you-work or where-I-work. And it certainly doesn’t compel me to put myself or my employer at risk of retaliation from a powerful energy corporation.
You are obviously trained in avoiding hard issues by trying to move the focus to the person bringing the issues up. Well I am trained in countermeasures to that tactic.
Obviously you’ve made your choices in life and it’s been “okay” for you to support an employer and an industry that are both incredibly abusive of the environment and of human rights.
And it seems equally clear that you support Microsoft’s “fuck the world” style of ‘capitalism’ at every turn because it is the same brand of ‘capitalism’ that the oil and gas companies practice.
The question is not whether or not I have “saintly integrity”.
In the context of Microsoft, the question is whether or not people should be able to choose their OS and office suites. Obviously with the US government’s recent anti-trust ruling, they don’t believe the people should have a real choice.
And in the energy world, the question is whether or not people should be able to choose safe clean energy such as wind and solar instead of the abuse and pollution that oil and gas bring to the world. Obviously by looking at the current US government policy, they don’t believe people should have a choice either.
It takes someone of conscience and character to bring up the tough questions. Sure, I can say the world is screwed up, it’s all “crapitalism”, etc. However, it is these questions that are critical for the future of mankind.
Why would we want to have our digital infrastructure and tools owned almost entirely by one company and pay the high prices monopoly brings us? Why would we want pollution when we can have clean energy? Why would we want expensive energy when there is safe clean energy for much cheaper?
“All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.” — Thomas Jefferson
Until you provide me with the sources of funding for your employer (or even the name of your employer), chicken-shit, I would appreciate it if you would refrain from ever commenting on my integrity based upon my employment situation, ever again.
You are truly a Supreme Asshole, Michael, and I have never seen anything quite like you before. I guarantee you that you are not winning many “converts” by constantly playing this “Microsoft is the source of all evil” card – the world is just a little bit more complicated than that, I’m afraid, and most people realize that much, even if they do happen to despise MSFT. By all means, I welcome you to feel free to do so, I really couldn’t care less what you think, but don’t make it a personal issue with me please.
I second you Gil Bates.. he is a nut case… boy…
Thank you, Gil, for your boorish and uncouth language. “Supreme Asshole”, eh? I am honored. I thought that was your secret title reserved for the CEO of your company or the real Bill Gates.
You’ve done some initial work avoiding the real issues. Perhaps a few simpletons and halfwits will be fooled, but most people are quite alert to people getting shifty and angry and trying to use foul language to derail the conversation.
While I am flattered you want to know more about me and my work, I don’t give out that information on a first date, especially one of those Internet dating things. Maybe you are used to Microsoft’s “fuck the user” privacy policies where you can simply steal the information from the user?
I apologize for anything you feel is personal. If I were a lesser man, perhaps I would be personally offended by the crude insults your foul mouth has delivered. However, I realize you are just trying to work some things out with yourself, so I want to be sure you have enough space and support to do so.
I will honor your request concerning comments on your integrity and your work. Most of the time you have gone to great lengths to hide your employer while you write all your glowing and fawning comments supporting Microsoft. I know the reason now so there is no need for me to discuss it in public from this point on.
And you are wrong about Microsoft. More and more people are realizing they are an evil company. And by evil, I mean “morally bad or wrong”, same as what the dictionary has to say. The world movement is away from Microsoft, not towards it. Microsoft offers nothing to the world except closed-source spyware-enabled software at monopoly prices. And license agreements that are incredibly one-sided and often injurious to the customer.
“A noble man compares and estimates himself by an idea which is higher than himself; and a mean man, by one lower than himself. The one produces aspiration; the other ambition, which is the way in which a vulgar man aspires.”
— Marcus Aurelius
“…Most of the time you have gone to great lengths to hide your employer while you write all your glowing and fawning comments supporting Microsoft. I know the reason now so there is no need for me to discuss it in public from this point on.”
I post to OSNews from multiple computers around town, shithead. My home connection is generally configured to run through a proxy somewhere at all times, for obvious reasons, while my connections from workplaces never are (and I have never cared about this). End of mystery.
“Assumption is the mother of all fuck-ups.”
Thank you for the clarification and what seems to be more of your obligatory smutty and profane insults.
It was certainly my assumption that your request to me on not commenting about your “work situation” was also related to the fact that the bulk of your posts are made via a proxy server of some sort. Mea culpa.
You might want to consider picking up the habit of attributing your quotes. Seems like another one of those nasty Microsoft habits is still kicking around — you know, using source code and then not listing its use or its copyrights…
“He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it.” — Martin Luther King, Jr.
Eugenia Loli-Queru can you moderate the granola, tree hugging, sandle wearing, hippy -vs- corp. Evil discussion?
I want to talk about OS related material.
I was wondering, if anyone has actually tried UNIX services in a production environment.
Dan
WOW!
How childish.
I second that!
I completely agree.
Man, this Michael is realy nuts! Please Eugenia, do some cleaning here. I don’t think that Michael belongs here.
Thanks!
Moderate the whole thing into oblivion. It has been beaten into the ground and is quite ready to rest in peace. Without nested threads, it is rather obnoxious for those not participating.
Before the thread goes away, I must say I really get a kick out of the anonymous voice from Canada (a Gil Bates shill it looks like). I guess they don’t have “freedom of speech” or know what it means.
I promise that the next time I get royally troll-baited like this, I will not make any response other than to make a request for you to moderate the offending comment out of the thread.
Sorry guys.
Of course I meant ‘Eugenia and David’.
Likely as a reminder of what happens when I do something stupid on a public thread and then the other person involved calls my stupidity and antes up more of his own.
America, the most environmentally sensetive nation on earth
Cheap shoot and you must know better. Freedom of speech is something that exist in Canada. But let me just remind you that this is OS NEWS. OS as Operating System. No need to bullshit or blast some other user opinion and making weird parallel on his job and compagnie he his working for and hell and mother earth dying… This is simply stupid and is getting us nowhere.
If you want to vent some frustration, do it somewhere else. If you want to talk about the subject (that is OS and Microsoft Windows Services for UNIX) do it here in peace and good maners.
That will be all I have to say about this.
Dear Anonymous Canadian (#2),
Oh, I agree my actions could be considered bad manners.
Finding out how an oil/gas industry worker using an anonymous web proxy was behind so many of the fawning pro-Microsoft on OSNews was something I should have kept to myself or a private thread if we were using some other software.
It is the connections in big industry and government that determine much of our lives; it is certainly not the posts on this board about alternative operating systems and the minutiae of software news… which are for the post part, only infotainment.
As for freedom of speech, if you start placing restrictions on it, there is no longer any freedom.
“I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”
— Alexis de Tocqueville
French historian, author of “Democracy in America”