At the end of November Microsoft posted a document on its Web site comparing the Windows XP Embedded and embedded Linux operating systems, with the emphasis on the technical and business inferiority of Linux. Embedded Linux distributors argue that the document not only distorts the value of Linux, but contains inaccuracies. Lineo, the embedded Linux company and one of the companies of which Microsoft is most critical, wrote a reply which is a point-by-point response to Microsoft’s attack. Embedded Linux vendor LynuxWorks joined the growing chorus of responses to Microsoft’s recent efforts to portray Embedded Linux as inferior to Windows XP Embedded from both technical and business perspectives. Read their reply at LinuxDevices.com.
Lineo, LynuxWorks Respond to Microsoft Attack on Embedded Linux
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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Embedded Windows XP sounds very much as a joke to me. Not that embedded Linux sounds much better, but give me a break. The worlds most sluggish OS on relatively slow platforms. Why not go for embedded OSX, when they are at it.
Not that it is my field of work, but it sounds as a stupid, stupid idea.
It’s really pathetic that microsoft has resorted to mud-slinging the same way that politicians do. All I want is an OS that will run APPS correctly without crashes. Why has the definition of an OS been so distorted ?
many companies who have been working on embedded products for long have experience working with qnx. i really don’t see them switching to either embedded xp. at least with embedded linux, the os can be freely modified (within liscense).
windows is designed for end users. embedded devices are configured and modified only by the manufacturer. there is no incentive to switch to a wizardized os except in the few cases where compatability with microsoft proprietary filetypes are needed.
MS will retract there comments and claim the reation is a misunderstanding, like they always have.
as usual
I wouldn’t have thought either of these over-hyped operating systems would be interesting for embedded systems. Compared to real time OSes like QNX, compared to portable OSes like NetBSD. (Well, there isn’t anything else like NetBSD in that respect.)
Portable, surely Linux is known to run on various architectures? OK, but what is
“Linux”? Ever try to bootstrap the GNU C library? When NetBSD says it supports 30-40 different platforms, that means you can go to http://ftp.netbsd.org and get everything, from the boot floppies to X servers, for every one of them. See http://www.wasabisystems.com/ for more on this in the context of embedded systems.
Hype and FUD are their main business achievements.
During the eighties their OS was sooo inferior compared to Amiga`s offerings. Yet people bought their crap. Actually most Windows boxes do today can still be done on Amigas and sometimes even better. (There hasn`t been a new Amiga motherboard since 1993!)
Half of the people think Microsoft introduced multi-media and the other half thinks that apple invented the Graphical User Interface….. Marketing and immoral behaviour are more important than innovation and technology, so it seems..