Your chances of running a Mac officially in the workplace, unless your job description warrants it, are pretty close to zero. That doesn’t mean it can’t be done. A little sleuthing, a little know-how, and your colleagues will be asking why your computer is so much cooler and easier to use than theirs. Finally, there are some things that your Mac is going to have trouble doing. Corporate applications written specifically for Windows may run under Virtual PC. Then again, they may not, says PCWorld.
Mac OS X in a Windows world
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
Can single-button mouse clickers can handle these instructions?:
You may be lucky, in that your office system simply uses DHCP to assign an IP address, no authentication required.
Chances are, there’s a proxy guarding your access to the Net. This is where some of your sleuthing comes in handy. On your Windows machine, check its networking config, making note of your user name, your Windows domains and most importantly the address and port of your Web proxy.
I’ve often heard that IT workers prefer more knowledgeable, non-Mac operators.
How does having a single mouse button affect finding out DHCP settings? Most Windows users will have trouble with that as well. Its just one of those things you gotta pay for if you want to be a rebel and use non-standard stuff in offices.
you ppl know that you can use any usb mouse in mac? be it a simple 3 mouse whell mouse or a 10 button’s
Out of a hundred PCs here at work, we have the only other Mac here (the other one being personally used by me but is out and busted – a Beige G3) that I administer, its sole purpose is to be a test machine as with some other test PCs … and yet, most of the employees still calls that Mac a ‘Test PC’
Anyway, its pretty cool as they look at me as the Mac guru here at work 😉
You forgot to mention if you’re one !?
Why can’t there ever be intelligent conversation. Some people care about the look of something. I personally like Macs. Do I own one, no, but they are visually appealing. that isnt the point though. Regardless of where that statistic came from, your basically calling Mac users gay. Its this type of 5 year old stuff that gets people mad. You and the majority of the computing population may not care about Apple and thats fine, but to call those that do own and adore Macs is juvenile and petty. It is very clear that you dont like Mac’s but because of the way you went about saying it, no one will care about you or what you have to say in the future.
I like the looks, the way they cool the latest G5 and the fact that it’s BSD inside. I don’t like the price, the arrogance of the brand and the support.
Unless a user really needs to do video editing, buying a mac is a waste of money for a company.
The main problem here would be to run any application except the ones we have running on unix hosts and that people use through Exceed.
We have quite a few VB/Access type of internal tactical apps that would be a be a major problem for IT.
The main problem I find is that there is absolutely no platform discussion happening here. We have Unix, NT,XP and AS400 and it’s basically up to the suppliers of external software to define what we need to have. I don’t think it is that uncommon.
Ah yes, everyone knows only homosexuals use Macs. Grow up. Seriously. Aside from the fact that a place might prefer them Macs still have a good standing in the graphics and music industries. Not to mention with it’s acquisitions in media apps Apple’s trying to even further retake this ground.
Every platform has its share of zealots, but now that OS/2 has finally disappeared, the most annoying ones are the Apple zealots. Nothing against the company or the platform, but I find the number of people who treat Apple as their primary relition very off-puting.
and i’ve got a really hot girlfriend. and what’s the problem with gay people? Homophobic?
My workplace is a unix and mainframe shop, we usually ssh into one of the large clustered servers so it doesn’t matter if you’re using mac, windows, linux, or amiga, so long as you have a tcp/ip stack and some ssh/ssl libraries.
You can also run applications remotely with X11.
The things that I hate are that my corporation relies on microsoft technology for their internal website, anytime you need to edit a timecard or download a patch, or get help from the help desk, you have to go through this abominable set of asp pages. Normally it gets stuck in safari, fucking m$.
Why can’t they just make things that work and are compatible?
All presentations work fine through openoffice or mac office 2004. java is cross platform. The things I hate are the fact that I have to sometimes fix some bugs for one our windows vc++ applications. compiling that thing through vpc would be heresy, we can’t wait 4 days for it to compile.
and real developer would love to use nix.
@Anonymous (IP: —.adsl.wanadoo.nl)
Mac “zealots” have nothing on BAF (Blind Amiga Followers). Ever seen people wanting to get rid of a P4 hot rod PC in favor of a beat up used 68K based PC because they hate Windows?
The worst of the lot must be GPL/Linux zealots. At first, I didn’t understand what was the connection between Linux zealots and them being called communists. But after a while, it’s become very evident. They’re never wrong and they’re the best. Outside the reality distorsion field, in reality land, it’s they can’t accept positive criticism and they ain’t nowhere near being the best.
Btw IBM’s OS/2 as not disappeared yet. It’s called eComStation now.
“the arrogance of the brand.” What a load of BS. Get a clue.
My guess is that the new Britney Spears album you just bought was recorded on a Mac using ProTools!
Every platform has its share of zealots, but now that OS/2 has finally disappeared, the most annoying ones are the Apple zealots. Nothing against the company or the platform, but I find the number of people who treat Apple as their primary relition very off-puting.
Haven’t you heard the news? The number of annoying Linux ‘zealots’ may have actually surpassed the number of annoying Mac zealots. Just when we were finally able to subdue to OS2 freaks, another group of ‘off-puting’ non-conforming, communists rises up to challenge our ‘right-thinking’ ways.
I’m not 100% sure about the desktop machines, but at least when it comes down to laptops, the price isn’t bad.
Sure, the PC market has low budged laptops, but compare quality PC laptops with a PowerBook and you’ll find that the prices are quite on par.
And iBook is just 1200 euro’s. Compare that to an IBM and you’ll find that the iBook is quite cheap. PowerBooks and IBM Thinkpad’s are in the same price range.
But then again, most people don’t care about quality these days. An HP, Dell or Medion laptop will do fine for them.
As a non-gay Mac user, certified Unix admin, and developer for enterprise business software in a Windows world I recommed the Mac to many people. I have also brought my personal PowerBook in and connected it to the office network.
The Mac UI is a well thought out and designed pice of software. The operating system does not get in the way of the user trying to get his/her work done. The only time I recall having/needing to reboot my desktops is when I choose to download and apply updates. The upfront cost of a shrink wraped Mac computer is higher than the upfront cost of a shrink wraped PC, but they are built with more care and designed to last longer.
I feel for the user’s of XP who are going to have to go through the nightmere of updating to XP SP2
You kids all need to grow up, or read slashdot for a month and get sick of it. Then you’ll realize that feeding trolls is not good policy.
Are there actually workplaces that lax on security? Here at the hospital where I work you can’t just plug any old pc (or mac) onto our network and go to town. First of all, we use static IP’s just for this purpose. (well, not just that, but that’s one of the reasons) We do NOT run everyone as administrators, users canNOT change or even view their network settings. We don’t even allow them to change the wallpaper or screensavers. You can do a lot with active directory and network policies. Our network is locked down as tight as we can get it and we are trying all the time to lock it down even more. Are we alone in this regard, or do others see this where they work as well? Here security is our number one focus. We could care less if the user is happy with the look of there desktop or not.
I use Macintosh at work. We have a G5, G4, and two G3 systems.
The G5 is a damn fine peice of work and a real pleasure to use. a Dual 1.8 w/ 2gb ddr 400 ram. They all proser in our windows centric network; when we’ve been hit by a virus strain, all the win98 systems go down, but the macs still keep trucking. very cool.
I also run a freelance operation and I have a G5 which is the main workhorse.
Mac it up baby.
if there is a need for a mac than the it shop will have them on hand for whatever reason warrants it.
to make up reasons why one would sneak a mac into a biz is a bit odd.
“and your colleagues will be asking why your computer is so much cooler and easier to use than theirs”
macs since os x are no easier to use than windows xp. this isnt 1993 anymore folks.
macs are no more stylish than plenty of pcs made. if one cares about style and looks, on the pc side, instead of a few basic choices (emac, imac, powermac, ibook, and powerbook)one has the option of choosing literally hundreds of styles, shapes, and colors to match ones taste and decor.
so unless you NEED a mac for some specific reason, buying one is a game for the vain. we all know that less than 1.8% of the computer using population of the world now finds it has NEED of a mac. and actually, much of that is not a NEED, but vanity…specifically the vanity of the wealthy in North America, Europe, and Japan.
the main reason why the whole world buys windows computers, regardless of its attendant problems, is that they want to avoid all of the problems this article mentions. people buy windows pcs so that things work the smoothest. the world wants compatability more than fancy plastic cases and cute icons.
“I feel for the user’s of XP who are going to have to go through the nightmere of updating to XP SP2”
i felt the pain of upgrading at each of the main point releases of os x (dont even mention the pain of moving from classic mac os to x). at each point release of mac os x apps have broken and weeks or months were needed before updates to programs and hardware drivers were released.
to mention something so silly displays your agenda. no os ever made does such a good job of minimizing the pain of migrating/updating an os as windows.
… what has this turned into a mac bashing session. grow up. If you like it, use it. if you don’t, don’t. Nothing to see here, move along.
“I guess the only kinds of workplaces where Mac would be allowed is those with a high number of Homosexual people”
Three things come to mind here.
1. Does your posting have a point?
2. How is it relevant to this discussion?
3. What business is it of yours?
This has to be one of the Dumbest things I have ever heard. . . and I’m a windows guy!
“no os ever made does such a good job of minimizing the pain of migrating/updating an os as windows.”
I use my PowerBook at my job all the time. I do need to run VPC to run some Access databases but other than that I have no troubles at all. Most of our old mainframe applications have all been moved over to web based systems and we have web access to our Lotus Notes accounts.
Some of the departments in my agency also have PowerMac G3 and G4’s. You would be suprised about homw many Macs are used in government.
yeah, the Report Abuse thing is down and all… but do ya’ll think you could do a quick once over on this thread. all the discriminatory remarks and hate being relayed through some of the posts here is really uncalled for.
people buy windows pcs so that things work the smoothest.
Ha Ha Ha! tell that to the six people (not bad in a small circle of friends) I know in the past year that have moved to the mac after using my imac at home.
The reason they moved – their PC was too hard to use. They find that their macs “just work”
Sure macs have problems, what operating system doesn’t? I’m the only person left at work using a mac (I do some print work although it’s mainly wab work these days). No problems at all working with the PC’s. The only irritation I have is that if I connect to the server using SMB it leaves lots of files all over the PC server. other than that I have very few compatability issues.
What a crap excuse for an article! I can’t believe that people get paid money for printing some rather generic crap that isn’t as helpful, nor as descriptive as a simple google for the subjects would be.
Save time and go to http://www.macosxhints.com/ to get muchmore descriptive, and better help than this article provides.
At least now I remember why I stopped looking at PCWorld when I cam across it. the print version’s just as worthless.
the fact that the report abuse link doesn’t work has made this thread one of the worst yet.
same old tired issues coming from both sides. hey: if you like a mac use it (i like my powerbook and i use it), be happy that you don’t have to go through all the crap windows users go through. you’re probably not going to convert a die hard ms zealot any time soon.
and if you like windows, fine. i’ve heard enough already about windows “just working” (mostly in regards to working with other microsoft products). you’re probably not going to get a mac user to buy a pc in the near future. start saving your pennies for longhorn or something, i’m sure it will be every bit as “innovative” and spectacular as they say.
if you’re sitting on the fence: go buy a mac, use it for a month, if you can’t stand it, sell it on ebay. unlike used pcs, macs and laptops retain their value for quite a while after purchase. don’t trust what i’m saying, check ebay for yourself. i’d suggest an iBook or PowerBook which seem to be the best bang for the buck, or wait a few weeks for the new iMacs.
hey, and if you’re a linux user, all the better for you, linux on PPC is (for the most part) just as mature as linux for x86 and you get nice RISC hardware to run it on.
i have yet to read an article about someone who tried switching to OS X and hated it so much they went back to windows and wrote an article about it, nor have i read or found articles that talk about moving from OS X to windows. however its easy to find articles in the reverse.
Disclaimer: IAAUSA (I Am A Unix Sys-Admin)
What about an article from ex-Windows, now-Linux user who can’t stand Macs?
Actually that’s not completely true. I like Macs – but just not for me. Something about the interface bugs me. However, this is definatly me being set in my ways. I much prefer folders and XMMS/BMP/Winamp interface to iTunes/Rhythmbox for managing my music. It’s a bit like asking a mechanic to buy a car with the bonnet welded shut, sure, you can open up those welds, but you know it’s not really for you.
With that said…
I have started reccomending to non-hardcore gaming ‘average users’ to buy a Mac instead of a PC. Why? Because they just work. Spyware, viruses, and thirty thousand items clogging up the system tray just doesn’t seem to happen with Macs. Given that I’m the sys-admin (both offically and otherwise) for a couple of dozen people, I’m much more happy now that I can reccomend a nice unix system for people.
And the hardware looks snappy as well. It’s just a pity it all looks the same. (Oh, and I can’t afford it at the moment.)
When I was at OSCON pretty much all of the open source alpha geeks had iBooks/powerbooks running OS X.
In my company the support level from IBM was so low.
Some people have braught their own mac laptops and work with it.When they need to exchange files they just use an USB stick.
It’s not only Mac users, Vaio users are doing it as well.
When you get sick and tired of the Compaq EVO permaentely breaking network cards or the Thinkpad.(looks good at first) habit of loosing drivers, you just go ahead and buy your own thing, do your own support, and let the unhelpdesk deal with the rest.
I see the morons are loose again.
So in your humble opinion all MAC users are Homos.
I wouldn’t like to be charged with discovering how many brain cells are left in your head, one would need a large magnifying glass.
A brainless twat.
Yes I am a Mac user and no I ain’t queer.
You know you can use XMMS on the Mac right? Most linux apps work with a simple compile or you can use Fink.
Introducing a mac into a Windows-only workplace is not something you should undertake if you want an easy life or if you don’t have the patience of a saint. I’ve tried it and wrote a piece about my experiences a while back:
http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=6563
It’s true that your colleagues will drool over your hardware, but the novelty wears off after 5 minutes. Unless you have a mac-friendly / mac-aware support team (unlikely in Windows-only workplace), I would steer well clear.
… Personally, I use them all – each with their unique strengths and weaknesses: Panther, Mandrake 10 and XP.
It’s really ridiculous to have all these platform wars: each OS (or desktop environment: personally I prefer KDE) should, instead, try to learn from others, in order to go towards a common goal of beauty and usability.
… Maybe an utopia in today’s way too “competitive” (competition without a human goal, I’d say) world – but worth trying, anyway… 🙂
Unless I’m confused but the only way to successfully run Windows applications on OSX is with an emulator such as VMWare. This product cost which makes sense since it’s a commercial product but it requires an OSX user to install a Windows OS as a “Client” on top of the emulator just to run Windows software. Linux consumers understand there are several options to run Windows applications on Linux with out installing an emulator or the Windows OS. Such examples are Wine http://www.winehq.com/ which is free and stands for (Wine Is Not Emulation). Then there is commercial products of Wine such as Cross Over Office http://www.codeweavers.com and AclereX http://www.aclerex.com/ which is another commercial Wine software solution. Comparing cost it would appear running Windows applications on Linux would be far cheaper than running Windows applications on OSX.
If i had a choice i would use my Mac at work. Of course anything would be better than this dated POS thinkpad with windows 2000(PU)i am forced to used coupled with having Lotus Notes inflicted upon me. I would much prefer to use Entourage(a real email client).
You missed a point; Linux is not x86 only…
I can run LInux on my main computer at work; guess what, it’s a 3/6-way POWER4 box. Linux currently runs on the PPC, POWER, x86, Alpha, MIPS, PARISC, 68K, and a few more I can’t think of right now. I can also run Linux on my Mac which is a G3 box. The big thing is that even using Linux you’ll need an emulater if you’re not on an x86 box.
Also, VMWare is not an emulator. It’s a virtual machine system; thus it lets you run muliple native OS on a single box. If you’re going to run Windows on a Mac, then you’ll need BOCHS (open source) or Virtual PC (MSFT). Note that BOCHS will also run under Linux so you can run x86 code on non-x86 boxes.
The funnest thing is trying to run Mac software on an x86 box. While the PPC can easyly emulate an x86, the x86 processor can’t easyly emulate a PPC. The main issue is that the PPC has 32 integer registers and 32 floating point registers and about 10 control registers; compared to the x86’s 7 integer registers and 10 control registers. The x86 doesn’t have enough registers to keep the emulated registers on chip so all the registers must be stored in main memory (slow…).
//And the hardware looks snappy as well. It’s just a pity it all looks the same. (Oh, and I can’t afford it at the moment.)//
You’re a UNIX SysAdmin, and you can’t afford a Mac?
I’m sure a lot of people would love to have a Mac at their work-desk, but are probably ever going to. Take my former boss for instance: a certified Mac ‘evangelist’ who owns a bunch of them, and would go around recommending that everyone ought to use a Mac, especially when some new windows virus hit the scene.
This is the same guy who would then buy ~$500 cheapass PCs for the lab. Now being a university, we are entitled to discounts on the eMac, but the real problem in justifying buying Macs at least in our lab was that not a single instrument in the lab came with the software to control it using a Mac.
Either you workf for MS and are part of their PR department or you just want to flame. I will make this brief.
to make up reasons why one would sneak a mac into a biz is a bit odd.
This is the only part of your contribution that makes sense. Sneaking in Apache to substitue IIS was one thing, sneaking in a computer is another – “ITS HARDWARE DUMMY”. So yes, I am agreement with you here.
macs are no more stylish than plenty of pcs made. if one cares about style and looks, on the pc side, instead of a few basic choices (emac, imac, powermac, ibook, and powerbook)one has the option of choosing literally hundreds of styles, shapes, and colors to match ones taste and decor.
If you are female and you are talking about the guys that drool over your computer, then hey, have fun. But vice versa, your above statement could not be further from the truth.
I have never seen ANY female drool over any type of computer except for a Mac (CONCESSION: I have not met many female geeks but I am sure you can find one or two that will salivate over a Dell or Gateway, etc). Show me this town where your’e from so I can make sure I never pass through there and be molested by females screaming “I love my emachines and my Gucci purse…” – urgghhh, sounds blasphemous already.
BTW: Unless you have not noticed, I am not interested in my friends drooling over my computer – I am not part of the “super-jock-I-have-nothing-to-show-for-myself-so-please-check-out-my-p c-dude” crowd
macs since os x are no easier to use than windows xp. this isnt 1993 anymore folks.
if you have not given a mac at least a month, I am not interested in your opinion. It can been shown that given a mac, a pc user who is against them will claim torture if they use it for less than a week – many usually quit in the first five minutes.
The response I expect to the above goes something like “well if it takes me that long them it is not as easy as you make it to nya nya nya nya…”. No that is not the main reason.
Those who ar “actively opposed” to it have a psycholgical block for whatever reasons (I dont want to be wrong, it has cute colors – what do i geek-of-geeks need that for – the chicks will laugh at me, it is inferior to pc, mac users were actually right – i cant accept that – i canyt give them that, etc.).
For those that are not biased it has taken anywhere from 30 minutes (usually pro-sumers & it/CS people) to one or two days (granny and gramps). After that initial, unbiased exposure, they do not want to go back hence “once you go mac you never…”.
Many of these are so ingrained that you are not conscious that you are excercising these biases but you are.
so unless you NEED a mac for some specific reason, buying one is a game for the vain…
if i am starting a business i NEED to save money. the mac category of products has more “bang for the buck” than anyone else (I am talking hypothetical small to medium business):
[my one or two tech admin guys]:
**Xraid, Xserve, Xsan, + all open source apps & traditional unix apps(Apache, perl, python, ruby, mysql……….->)
[my one or two developer guys]:
if you are really small shop, the same guy can usually double as admin/developer – somewhat disparate skillsets in pc environment, no so much on mac. one among the reasons why is the ease of setting up multiple accounts/domains/subnets, etc., is exponetially way easier on mac you do not need certification
**linux/unix apps(see above), Xcode, filemaker, webobjects, jboss, tomcat, java, eclipe, netbeans, Xgrid, rendevous, etc., ……………….>
==>btw: check out new filemaker (“hold it flamers, i said small to mid biz OK” – I could already smell the SQL-S/DB/Oracle guys about to jump on me
[my secretary]:
**ms office (although there cheaper alternatives e.g. use appleworks[free] for basic business documentation + MYOB or Intuit accounting packages [vs.excel] for all accounting, bookkeeping, purchasing, etc.)
**iApps for any multimedia stuff she may have to do. if we want to “wow” the crowd with our presentations and demos we could even go for the pro-sumer apps (fcp-express, etc) @ 299.00USD a piece.
All of this plus unlimited client licences on X Server@999,00USD.
we all know that less than 1.8% of the computer using population of the world now finds it has NEED of a mac. and actually, much of that is not a NEED, but vanity…specifically the vanity of the wealthy in North America, Europe, and Japan.
i know that the meaning of words changes with time. just like the negative stigma attached to the word politics despite a generic definition that trancends govermental politics.
well, in the same vein, if vain nowadays means ROI, cost-reduction and optimization, pragmatism, sound business sense, TCO (btw, MS has never attempted to compete with apple with TCO as the advantage, rather ploys such as “we support DRM they dont Mr. RIAA MPAA” and yet they try that with free software – makes me wonder)… if all of this is the new meaning of vain, then i am vain.
the main reason why the whole world buys windows computers, regardless of its attendant problems, is that they want to avoid all of the problems this article mentions. people buy windows pcs so that things work the smoothest. the world wants compatability more than fancy plastic cases and cute icons.
i’m sorry man, if you took the word windows out of that sentence i would not be surprised if even Bill Gates thought you were talking about a mac over a pc. history has proven otherwise and IFF, and thats IFF you are really seeking the truth and not flaming, google will give you answers to the contrary.
over and over, especially in the last year, it has been shown by many reviewers (mostly pc sites/mags – see google if objectivity is of any interest to you) that apples offerings for small to mid businesses are:
**more than adequate,
**usually cheaper than competitors (virginia tech. 1st tried dell for their cluster)…
**… and yet with tools that are better(easy config/install, servers that email/phone admins when say 1 HDD is overheating, etc…),
**better support (almost always in top 3), etc, etc, etc.
Where you get your “facts” I do not know but it would be wise to check before publishing them here. And, if apples plastics are really that fancy then I guess it reflects better on them that they are using “fancy” materials AND making a profit when everyone else is using the same old stuff (higher economies of scale) but only one is actually making a profit out it. Makes one wonder…
I would recommend you read this:
http://www.apple.com/business/profiles/vespa/
and others from here:
********************
http://www.apple.com/business/
[/i]macs since os x are no easier to use than windows xp. this isnt 1993 anymore folks.[/i]
Yeah. You sure know what you are talking about. Keep on dreaming, dude..
http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/
I am the Windows and Exchange administrator for our North American sales offices located in San Jose. We have 44 Windows servers, 4 of which are a mixture of Exchange 5.5 and Exchange 2000 servers. I have an old Thinkpad running 2K I’m fond of, but I mainly use my Powerbook G4 15″ 1.25Ghz. I don’t use Virtual PC, instead for corporate web apps relying on IE 6 and Active X and ISAPI apps I connect to terminal services on half a dozen Windows servers using Microsoft’s Remote Desktop Connection. These are much faster performing connections than the Pentium II 350Mhz-like performance of Virtual PC.
The author clearly has not experienced Panther’s Mail program, otherwise the author would have noted its native Exchange Server support. This is much better than IMAP.
I have always loved Macs, even though I mastered Windows over my 16 year career going back to Windows 286. I have developed a healthy respect for the strengths and weaknesses of both platforms over the years. I don’t believe the Mac is a niche platform and I can make it fit in quite nicely. But IT shops generally prefer hardware and software standardization, and if something can be run on commodity Windows PCs, so much the better for the bottom line. I get away with it because I am the “Windows Guy” and I couldn’t get support anyway since I am the last line of escalation support here.
I think there are usually a few Macs in any large company, typically in the publishing/graphics/web design departments. Most of the casual (non-techie) Mac users that I’ve met love their Macs. I don’t know of anyone short of a developer who -loves- Windows.
Around here, you have to get approval to hook non-standard technologies into the network, be they Mac, Linux, BSD, etc. I think many large companies have similar policies.
Corporate users just need a couple of mainstream apps and they’re happy – email, browser, office suite, and maybe an way to connect to a mainframe. This pretty much means that with a little training and hand-holding, users should be able to use things such as (Linux|BSD|OSX) + Mozilla + OpenOffice. The cost savings in not having to patch the OS every week or pay the M$ tax should pay for such a migration.
-d.
Oh dear god.
OSNews comments has dropped to slashdot levels. Does anyone know a good tech news site where I can go from now on? Without babies?
Someones going to have to take over handing out the pacifiers while I’m gone. God forbid that would shut them up and allow adult discussion.
Matt
You are on the right thread on the right site. Indeed Mac users (such as Jean-Baptiste Boudenne) can’t have babies : they are Gay!
mac threads never fail to bring in ‘truthteller’ aka Anonymous (IP: —.chvlva.adelphia.net) to spew his FUD.
Dude, ‘ truthteller’ is easier to spell than ‘anon…’,why don’t you use it?
Plus we can skip over your post when you use your right speud.
Boys (and Girls)… when someone is as zzztupid as to post something like “these are gays because of that” or <insert whatever your imagination is up to>, you are NOT supposed to pay attention. In fact, tell me the truth, wouldn’t it be better if NOBODY post anything at all regarding that <non-intelligent> comment?
Be honest, what’s worse:
If you answer, you give him/her the chance to retaliate.
If you ignore… he/she will die in forgotten land (or realms) which, IMO, is the WORST THING. (been there!)
Sorry for the Off-Topic, but this Gay/Mac/PC/Eternal war seems eternal …
And for the sake of this Thread, allow me to apply Godwin’s Law prov.
The guy/girl who said Mac users are GAY is a NAZI.
(this may fail… but I’m trying)
[Usenet] “As a Usenet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one.”
There is a tradition in many groups that, once this occurs, that thread is over, and whoever mentioned the Nazis has automatically lost whatever argument was in progress.
Godwin’s Law thus practically guarantees the existence of an upper bound on thread length in those groups.
However there is also a widely- recognized codicil that any intentional triggering of Godwin’s Law in order to invoke its thread-ending effects will be unsuccessful.
.. i told ya
NinjaMonkey: It’s not that I can’t run xmms (or beep-media-player these days), that was just an example of how I prefer to do things, that the Mac way isn’t quite my way. It is true that I could bludgon the system into acting the way I want it to, but it would take more effort (for me), to do that, rather than install a Debian / GNOME system.
Example: Menu at the top of the screen. I know it’s better but… Call me Windows-infected, call me unable to change, but like spatial Nautilus, I’ve tried to like the thing, and I just can’t. Using it just infuriates me.
rockwell: Well, at the moment, I’m an unpaid sys-admin, student, trying to run own company, and non-profit help. Hence why it’s ‘at the moment’, but I do run unix servers where multiple people are quite vocal if they don’t work.
Although, when I have money – I’m eyeing up one of those sexy Powerbooks with an eye to dual booting Debian PPC on it.
“OSNews comments has dropped to slashdot levels. Does anyone know a good tech news site where I can go from now on?”
Start your own. And while you’re at it, see if you can find a public forum anywhere on the internet on any topic that has only mature conversation. This must be your first time on the internet. Welcome to cyber-civilization.
“Start your own. And while you’re at it, see if you can find a public forum anywhere on the internet on any topic that has only mature conversation. This must be your first time on the internet. Welcome to cyber-civilization.”
With work as it is I wouldn’t be able to keep up, no point having a “yesterdays news” site. I’m a member of a number of forums where everyone can hold a mature conversation. I’m not saying there isn’t flame wars or stupid comments, but there’s no intentional flame bait (first comment in this thread prime example), and there’s no resorting to playground tactics.
The majority of excellent forums are DIY and audio ones, everyones reached the “just because someone doesn’t agree with me doesn’t mean they’re wrong”.
I can’t remember when I first connected to the internet, but I remember thinking my replacement 14,000 modem was blazingly fast.
Still…you didn’t answer my question. So I’ll take it as you don’t know of one?
Matt
How many companies are actually going to let one of their employees wander in, plug in a completely unknown computer on which that user is a local admin and leave them to it?
Most companies have a pretty strict policy which is (1) You’re not a local admin, they’re bloody dangerous and (2) any larger company will have a standard client with a perfectly customised configuration.
If you boss finds out you’ve ditched the computer they ok’ed for one they’ve never seen before, you’re probably not going to be popular…
A short anecdote:
I once worked at one firm for a short while. Although they gave me an IBM Thinkpad to work with I also had my iBook with me (I spent the nights at the firm and wanted to take some personal data with me).
When you wanted to get onto the Internet your computers IP address either had to be added manually to the firewall, or you could adjust the DHCP info with custom Gateway and Router addresses, as the administrator told me.
After he gave me that information once it took me just a few seconds to get an IP via DHCP, adjust the addresses, and I had an Internet connection.
A few days later he gave the exact same information to the boss of the firm (certainly not the typical stupid boss, especially when it came to Microware OS-9) and another developer, who wanted to get online with a new laptop using Windows XP without having to reconfigure the firewall first.
Several *minutes* later they still weren’t online. I’m not sure if they ever managed it that way, because I left or otherwise they would have been irritated by me grinning.
It is pretty lame they have not fixed this. lowering security for any machine seems a little lame.
“Still…you didn’t answer my question. So I’ll take it as you don’t know of one?”
More than not knowing of one, I say they don’t exist. Rob Enderle has made part of his career on complaining about how “mean” Linux users are to him. He apprently doesn’t realize Windows, Mac, BSD, Solaris, etc. users can be just as difficult.
It’s a measure of a forums popularity, I think. Even a place like Anti-Online, where the conversation is rather on the boring side, they not only have troublemakers but routinely kick people out. Once a forum gets popular enough there is sure to be troublemakers. I’m in a few small Open Source forums where trolls never go, but it’s contingent on them remaining small. Also I don’t think OSnews is getting worse in that regard. There were flame wars and trolling going on when I first came here. I consider it a small price to pay for how much I’ve learned about various operating systems in between all those obnoxious comments.
“I’m not saying there isn’t flame wars or stupid comments, but there’s no intentional flame bait and there’s no resorting to playground tactics.”
Troublemakers just that. Does it matter how they cause trouble?
It’s funny when us Mac zealots keep trying to justify to the rest of the world how cool OS X is 😉
It’s just as funny when Linux zealots have to as well.
At work here it is starting to go the other way. When we are developing something new, and want to use a MS specific tool (such as COM or .Net etc…), we have to justify it over something that is cross platform. We’ve been biten really badly by COM, so don’t want to repeat the mistake again.
Someone put it really well before, you can’t use OS X for a few minutes, or even just a day or two and think you understand it.
The same goes with OS X users using XP, Gnome or KDE and thinking OS X is better.
You really have to use the OS for a while, get to know the “feel” and “style” of it. I think you will find that instead of hating other platforms, you will instead start to see that each has some really cool ideas and each work. I used to “hate” XP for a while there, now I don’t mind it as much, it has some good points.
I don’t mind people preferring other platforms, but to hate one is a little silly don’t you think? Hating zealots is a little silly as well, just feel sorry for us, and feel good inside that you know how good your {platform|platforms} of choice {is|are}.
If the “kids” that come to this site want to say stupid things, that’s fine, but us “adults” here shouldn’t bother. Lets get OSNews back to what it was…
“More than not knowing of one, I say they don’t exist. Rob Enderle has made part of his career on complaining about how “mean” Linux users are to him. He apprently doesn’t realize Windows, Mac, BSD, Solaris, etc. users can be just as difficult.”
Very true, every OS has it’s zealots, who will argue black is white.
“Troublemakers just that. Does it matter how they cause trouble?”
I didn’t mean specific troublemakers, I meant there’s occasionally arguments about technicalities, which imo go too far and are stupid/pointless. For example, someone says “it cost $300 back then” and someone corrects them with a link, and it degrades from there (counteracting the correction, people saying it doesn’t matter it’s just a price, people saying they can’t afford…I’m sure you’ve seen it all before). Also, like you I’m a member of smaller forums where everyone knows everyone else. That goes a long way I think.
“I consider it a small price to pay for how much I’ve learned about various operating systems in between all those obnoxious comments.”
I agree, a site like this is valuable to learn a lot. That’s why I read it! I use OS X, Windows and Linux. If I had the time and expertise I’d fiddle with a lot more (like I used to). I think my next project will be getting Freevo to work. If I want it to do something, and it does it, I’ll use it. If it doesn’t do the next thing I want, it’s gone.
Matt
http://linuxinsider.com/ http://www.macnewsworld.com/ http://www.ofb.biz/ http://www.g4techtv.ca/ http://www.geekextreme.com/ http://securityfocus.com/
Thanks
I didn’t know about MacNewsWorld or OfB. Good stuff.
Matt
And without trying to sound like I’m looking for brownie points I really do think this it the best OS news site. Slashdot has some good articles too but alot of stuff I would consider boring as well. Sometimes just a little geekish for me.
i dont know if this has been mentioned or not (i stopped reading the comments after this became a flame war), but wont ximian evolution with the exchange connector work in osx? correct me if im wrong, but doesnt it support more exchange features then the client by microsoft?