Windows XP SP2 is 99% great, but the 1% that isn’t turns a gift into a bomb. If Microsoft wants to win hearts and pocketbooks, then the product teams need to relearn how to treat customers with respect. With minimal effort, Microsoft could show paying customers that they are valued partners, rather than adversaries. Karsten Schneider writes about his experience with SP2, and his ideas of what it would take to turn a rock into rocks!
the popups aren’t so annoyin’
nobody ever reads the license agreement, but if you’re not doin’ anything wrong, what’s the deal?
the baloons at the bottom of the screen are really anoying, but after some time and properly configured system, they vanish
but, i have to agree, the overall experience for a new user with, let’s say, windows 98, was even better
and, i have te agree, a simple apt-get in linux is really more effective than thousands of downloads and little dialogs from windows update
but, after all, it’s just a matter of taste
windows is not that bad, and linux is not thaaat good
i dont think he was so much saying that the linux experience is any better, but more “look at the way this works in another similar product that i use. why cant microsoft have something more like that?”
considering that microsoft is the biggest i.t. company out there, and windows is a flagship product, theres no real excuse for it to be one of the most painful to install/maintain.
That people will always find something to bitch about. This guy is whinning about the number of reboots and license agreements, WTF? I hate to say it, but the ‘popup spam’ is there as a security reminder in order to beat lazy Joe Sixpack into submission, unfortunately I think that is necessary.
As for apt-get, I think it’s good in theory but flawed in execution. If they ever figure out a way to tie it into the package’s homepage so that I always get the current verison of everything, instead of a package that’s three months old, then it would kick ass. As for now, I’d rather just go get the files myself .. at least I KNOW what I’m getting.
And finally, what is the deal with reboots? I mean, XP aint’ a server OS, and for some reason it’s like people fear rebooting like it was the black plague of death. The Windows box I am typing this on has been up for weeks. Sure, rebooting occassionally is necessary when applying updates, but it is just not a huge issue for me. Why should I give a shit if my box has been up for months at a time, other than bragging rights?
I suspect that the problem level is much larger then 1% if it causing this much discontent on its users. For my money M$ hasn’t been on the beat when it comes to caring for customers. I remember the past years of Win3.1 being a joke, a constent stream of flaky software, Windows98 having to be reinstalled every two months because of FS corruption, cheap programming tools ment solely to get their name in the headlines and now an OS that is sufficating their users. Enough of my rant I shall let the future of Windows speak for me.
SP2 from Microsoft. It is a big marketing scheme to remind people that the Big Brother is still here.
A simple patch to fix a problem would suffice but that would not stir up all this havoc on the Internet community and less attention to M$.
Buhhh.
“hate to say it, but the ‘popup spam’ is there as a security reminder”
Sure bud. All those popups about messenger, hotmail and passport… sure they are for security… lolrof!
“I hate to say it, but the ‘popup spam’ is there as a security reminder in order to beat lazy Joe Sixpack into submission, unfortunately I think that is necessary. ”
The security reminder is a way for Microsoft to make more money. Any app I want to distribute over the Internet pops up this ominious sounding message to end users when they try to install it. The only way for me to avoid this is to buy a certificate proving that my download is “trusted”, thus avoiding the pop-up warning. The certificates are NOT cheap.
“The only way for me to avoid this is to buy a certificate proving that my download is “trusted”, thus avoiding the pop-up warning.”
Well, there is one other way. I can place my app in a zip file. The security thing won’t worn a bout a zip file and then once it is downloaded, and the user opens the zip file, the user won’t get the message. But this has two problems. 1st, it inconvienances the user. 2nd, it defeats the whole purpose of my self contained installer.
And of course, 3rd, it kind of defeats the whole purpose of the security system anyway since if someone wants to distribute a trojan, all they have to do is put it in a zip file and then direct the user to unzip the file after it is downloaded.
“turn a rock into rocks” – i really love it.. but where do you see this “rock” ? and for the future i can’t imagin windows becoming rocks(olid) – it’s rather got the superface of a rock: sandy and unfavorable for life (like mars if you want…only that mars isn’t expected to crash soon
)
that people will always find something to bitch about. This guy is whinning about the number of reboots and license agreements, WTF? I hate to say it, but the ‘popup spam’ is there as a security reminder in order to beat lazy Joe Sixpack into submission, unfortunately I think that is necessary.
Every user has the right to bitch about the OS and the whole feel to the OS or anything else he wishes to do so. Those popups are more than annoying, they take up memory everytime they feel like reminding of something. Of course, you can turn them off, but why not have like a question when the installer is almost done. such as: how familiar are you with windows”
And finally, what is the deal with reboots? I mean, XP aint’ a server OS, and for some reason it’s like people fear rebooting like it was the black plague of death. The Windows box I am typing this on has been up for weeks. Sure, rebooting occassionally is necessary when applying updates, but it is just not a huge issue for me. Why should I give a shit if my box has been up for months at a time, other than bragging rights?
Its not just bragging rights, but I don’t want to reboot my computer if i don’t have to. I left my computer on for a week and i end up havint to reboot it because the NIC card wasn’t getting an IP anymore and everything was fine on the comp.. so XP isn’t all that great nor all that bad.
My two cents worth:
It’s been said many times before, in this forum, that Microsoft is more of a marketing company than a software company.
Windows XP is nothing more than a marketing tool disguised as an operating system. I’m constantly reminded to sign-up for Microsoft-this or Windows-that. Want to connect to the Internet? Guess what you get? An advert for MSN. First time you get Internet Explorer to connect to the Internet, where do you go – MSN! You’ll waste a good 5 minutes on each XP install just turning this stuff off, if you know what you’re doing.
It’s no wonder new users think the Internet/I.T. world revolves around Microsoft. Microsoft wouldn’t have you believe anything else exists!
For those thinking the author in the article is just whining, how many have actually read Microsoft’s license agreements? The reason they may pop-up with every new patch and/or service pack is the original license agreement may be getting amended. Better start reading those in the future – they certainly won’t be in your favour!
My signature says it all about my feelings about Windows in general:
Spyware, Adware, Viruses and BSOD? What Spyware, Adware, Viruses and BSOD! I use Linux!
XP in general is much more stable in the sense of BSOD, but the security issues, spyware, adware and viruses are just to much to handle for the average user. I’ve seen systems so badly infected that they became useless and a full format/reinstall was necessary to correct the problems. Is Linux perfect? No, but it’s getting there and faster than many think or want to believe (MS)!
heh… Kind of ironic isn’t it? I try to release a perfectly legimate free software program for people to download off the Internet. It contains no viruses, no trojans, no spyware, and no Adware. But yet users get an ominous warning when trying to install it.. And yet other companines, including Microsoft itself, can install spyware on my system without even warning me that it is being installed… What’s wrong with this picture?
Don’t get me wrong, Im no Microsoft fan, and I run Linux as my primary OS at home, but give credit where credit is due. I have already upgraded an entire office to SP2 and it was happily very simple and trouble free. Frankly, Ive been very impressed with MS on this one. The level of annoyance that the author is complaining so much about was actually less then I expected from MS. They’re actually improving!
I have to use Windows 2000 at work and the one thing that annoys me is that M$ is always question what i do. Are you you want to delete that…are you sure about this and that, etc. I feel like I have to fight to get things done. But to their credit, its far less annoying than it used to be in windows 95.
in fact
what i think about windows
it’s a copy, especially from mac os x
people used to say mac’87 win’95
now mac’x win’xp
at the end of the day, it works
but
as matt showed, i have to admit, we pay a large amount of money for a product that is inferior in some key aspects
mac os x and linux have lower prices [linux has no price
] and work better at these aspects
i think we pay not for a system, but for the large support it has [from applications to devices]
oh, and i hate alsa, oss, esd, arts or any other thing that makes the linux sound system so complex
I think you folks are concentrating on the wrong thing in that article. It’s not about whose operating system is better. It’s about human engineering and social psychology. How many of you ran an application that you thought was not programmed for the average user (or for humans for that matter). It’s about respect for users and customers. You see it in all aspect of life. It’s the same for example with doors that have Push or Pull stickers on them because you can’t figure in advance which way they open.
I thought it was a good article because it was not a bitch fest but looking at an installation from the human perspective. If other manufactures can install major applications on win32 without reboot why not Microsoft. Why not implement next time the user reboot. Stop arguing about whose Schwartz is bigger…!
Look, I like and use both Linux and Windows all the time — but I have to tell you, Linux will never succeed as a desktop OS in its current state. Here are my pet peeves…
Wireless is horrible under Linux. Seriously heinous. If you can even get drivers, getting them to actually work requires an act of God. Until this works properly, Linux is a non-starter. That *has* to be a priority among Linux developers.
Ditch the command-line. Look, I use bash constantly. I like using a command-line. But only 0.00001% of all desktop users (a) know what a command-line is for and (b) know how to use it. That means all OS services, all configuration files, all application settings need to be gettable/settable via decent UI — not command-lines and editors.
I would virtualize the UNIX filesystem even farther. I wouldn’t expose it to the end-user. Neither Windows nor Linux does a good job of providing a logical workspace to the user that makes any sense. Drive letters, NFS paths … all of that crap is for geeks, not users. It’s about time that somebody built a separate logical filesystem on top of existing filesystems that looks exactly the same. I think it would be enough to create a bunch of random folders underneath some common mount point that expose “My Documents”, “My Music”, and keep users in that logical namespace, not the rest of the filesystem, etc. Of course, it would still be possible for geeks to drop to a command-line and get their work done. But it would greatly simplify users’ lives.
Linux app setup is crap. No need to say much more about this. RPM ain’t good enough. Users want automated setup — or setup driven through UI. They don’t want to extract tar files and mess around with gzip, put things in the right place, edit config files. That won’t fly with desktop users.
My two cents. Be kind. I could have ignored this thread — but I took a chance on being honest. ;-p
Randy hits the nail right square on the head!!!
“As for apt-get, I think it’s good in theory but flawed in execution. If they ever figure out a way to tie it into the package’s homepage so that I always get the current verison of everything, instead of a package that’s three months old, then it would kick ass. As for now, I’d rather just go get the files myself .. at least I KNOW what I’m getting.”
That’s not possible. If you want to know why, google for linking libraries, or something like this.
It can be done with source, and it’s very possible, it’d prolly look a lot like ports when finished.
Part of the job of distribution is well, distribution.
I agree – mostly.
Wireless is coming along fairly nicely. I’ve played with a properly supported PCMICA card, and by and large, it just works – although I understand some further improvements are due in GNOME 2.8 for user configuration. The problem with drivers rests very squarely with the hardware manufacturers. If they don’t release specifications, or adaquate binary drivers (nVidia style), and force people to jump through hoops with badly made and documented custom configuration programs, then yes, it’s going to suck.
I agree with you up to a point on the command line. I draw the line when people start demanding that things like Apache and sendmail be configurable from a GUI. No – these are big boys toys, and if you want to run a server, you can learn how to run it properly.
That said, installation of debian packages with a double click (using gksu or similar) would be nice.
I disagree with virtualization of the file system. GNOME already does for the most part, and most users don’t care (and rightly so) about anything outside of their home directory. If my teenage-I-hate-computers sister can use GNOME and KDE, and can handle the unix file system, I don’t see why nobody else can. There’s making an interface simple to use, and then there’s making it impotent for a small bunch of users who refuse to learn to use a tool before using it. I have zero interest in helping out the second group.
RPM is broken. apt-get/deb fixed this problem a long time ago. We’re just waiting for the mainstream RPM based distros to get a clue. Lindows has nice interface on top of apt-get, which would be well worth looking at, and imitating.
You know, yes the popup warnings are annoying, but the joe-six pack comment is bang on.
They are NOT there for people like us who know what we are doing, and frankly, this sounds greatly like simple lazyness on the part of those griping the loudest, which is odd since it sounds like the last people who should complain about jumping through hoops.
Seriously, is checking the box “Do not warn me” or opening up the security and changing “how windows reminds me” really that hard? Simple one-time changes, you never see warnings again. After installing SP2 I was able to easily flip off all the warnings, and haven’t seen them since.
And I did all that without to open up a terminal window, struggle with the archaic vi to edit a minor config file in god only knows what directory that I may or may not have access rights to, just to change the behavior of my file browser. You know it’s bad when the best text editor included with an OS distro is barely as capable as what came with DOS 3.3
I see people bitching and complaining about the reboots – a normal user can DO a reboot. A normal know nothing user can manage a SP2 install.
How many ‘joe-sixpacks’ do you know that could manage changing their kernel, or even installing a device driver under linux? If they are LUCKY it may come in a package that their existing kernel/distro supports, but I’ve never seen it work out that way. You try talking a user through running make on something that requires sources they (may or may not ) have installed and very quickly the nube is yelling “Put windows back on it!”
We are talking the equivalent of Kernel, Driver, Firewall and even possibly a new TCP/IP stack (if you haven’t already installed the ipV6 patch) without ever seeing the command line or anything more complex than “[Back] [Next] [Cancel]” If new versions of all of the above came out in linux, with lets say a new desktop manager and a new version of XFree, how many of you can say you’ve been able to uprate all at once sucessfully from one installer, without after hours of dicking with dependancies on the command line resort to burning out a full version of the latest distro and using that instead?
I used to be a big linux fan, and still wouldn’t put anything else on a small office server, but desktop side I found I was spending more time dicking with the OS to make even the simplest things work (video, sound, nic, updating software)- To the point I wasn’t getting anything REAL actually done. For someone weaned on Xenix it was a harsh lesson. Basically, I grew up.
SP2? I don’t see the problem… Guess it’s all a matter of perspective.
“They are NOT there for people like us who know what we are doing, and frankly, this sounds greatly like simple lazyness on the part of those griping the loudest, which is odd since it sounds like the last people who should complain about jumping through hoops.”
I’m not complaining that I have to jump through hoops. I am complaining that my customers have to jump through hoops.
Before I forget, anyone taking bets on how long before a firewall manufacturer sues M$ for including a firewall for free with windows?
Why not? They’ve gotten sued every other time they try to package something with it for free.
Yeah, but at least we don’t have to pay $99 every eight months for patches masquerading as a new version of the OS.
Have fun buying Tiger in what, a month or two?
I doubt seriously that a firewall manufacturer is going to sue MS over Windows Firewall (but you never know). Microsoft already had a lamer version (ICF) on the box dating back to SP1 and earlier — so it’s not like this is a new thing. What might happen is that somebody could entreat the feds to sue MS on their behalf. The Bush Administration doesn’t seem to be all that receptive to antitrust cases, though. Nor should they. I think the Clinton Administration’s lawsuit was a shakedown to wring money out of dotcom-era companies.
And finally, what is the deal with reboots? I mean, XP aint’ a server OS
Ehm, it sure can be a server OS just like Windows 2000 or Windows NT 4.
and for some reason it’s like people fear rebooting like it was the black plague of death. The Windows box I am typing this on has been up for weeks. Sure, rebooting occassionally is necessary when applying updates, but it is just not a huge issue for me. Why should I give a shit if my box has been up for months at a time, other than bragging rights?
The big deal is that you have to stop EVERYTHING the computer is doing, backup, and wait a minute or so. If you’re used to something which doesn’t ask you this then this easily ticks you off.
Look, i’m not even that mad when its because of a driver (its not very nice though. Microkernel…?) but if a simple application demands it, that is just plain ridiculous.
Linux app setup is crap. No need to say much more about this. RPM ain’t good enough. Users want automated setup — or setup driven through UI. They don’t want to extract tar files and mess around with gzip, put things in the right place, edit config files. That won’t fly with desktop users.
Would you care to elaborate on this. Whats wrong in your oppinion. I somehow doesn’t remember me untaring files and putting thins in right places all that much when I installed my fedora desktop. Nor do I remember handediting config files to get the desktop going.
You are right that rpms alone aren’t sufficeent to install software, as they doesn’t automagically resolve dependencies, but most Linux system comes with tools yum, apt-get,… that fixes this autmagically for you.
If you install a new package it usually installs without any questions where to put stuff. At most you say yes to the question if you want to install. To me this is much better than in windows where the user often have to chose where to put files, and once he have chosen a place there half of the files goes to some system catalog just the same. To make it worse there is no way of knowing what files have gone where once the install is done. Compare this to e.g. rpm on Linux where in most Linux distros all installed packages are kept track of in a database and you can ask what package a specific installed file belongs to. I wish this was possible in windows system directories.
“A hundred MB download isn’t that big a deal for me, because I have a broadband connection. But it’s hard to believe that there really are a hundred MB worth of changes in what was installed.”
There’s so much in Windows now and so much opportunity for serious bugs, I could believe even a delta-compressed patch would be dozens of megabytes by now.
//i love small, realize it’ll never happen
There is something refreshing about M$ bashing. To know that we can all get together and “fight the man.” To band together and reminisce about the non-existant good ole days where things possessed that “great out-of-the-box experience.” please. such a thing never existed, and we’d all be the worse off without M$ poking and prodding the market to the point where its at. Why complain? Take all your complaining time – add it all together, and use all that time for something useful. I bet you could learn some new code and get hired by M$ or $un. Then you could grace the world with your updates and patches, to which lowly nerds would band together and reply in one voice, “where is that great out-of-the-box experience?”
Well, since I’m too lazy to make multiple replies to all the things I wanted to add to this, I’ll do it in one message…
@Edward, who said “That said, installation of debian packages with a double click (using gksu or similar) would be nice.”
‘apt-get install gdeb’ Then you can double-click on them through Nautilus and it’ll ask for your root password, then you can simply click the install button.
@deathshadow, who said “We are talking the equivalent of Kernel, Driver, Firewall and even possibly a new TCP/IP stack (if you haven’t already installed the ipV6 patch) without ever seeing the command line or anything more complex than “[Back] [Next] [Cancel]” If new versions of all of the above came out in linux, with lets say a new desktop manager and a new version of XFree, how many of you can say you’ve been able to uprate all at once sucessfully from one installer, without after hours of dicking with dependancies on the command line resort to burning out a full version of the latest distro and using that instead? ”
I do it all the time, with Debian. Using either synaptic or the command line. Very easy process. You can easily keep your old kernel as well, in case the new one has some sort of issues.
@deathshadow (again) “Let’s be honest – As a desktop OS Linux hasn’t even caught up to Windows 3.1 in terms of program and driver installation.”
Oh come on, do you even rembember Windows 3.1? It sucked NUTS. It was pure crap. All drivers had to be installed through DOS, since it was just a GUI wrapper for it.
@the article itself. The best “Out of Box” experience I’ve ever had was on the Atari ST and the Amiga. Those Operating Systems just plain WORKED. But that’s mostly due to having a standard platform, the same way that the Mac for the most part does.
“Seriously, is checking the box “Do not warn me” or opening up the security and changing “how windows reminds me” really that hard?”
It can be if they want to make it that way, which they have. It took me a good week of clicking through the bubble spam (what a great cliche!) before I actually hunted through the new security centre and eventually found the correct checkbox to check. It was getting bad, too, I’d dread having to restart, it was almost like having to re-install, “Aw man, do I have to go through all that [download security updates, install AV and adaware] again?”
I was very unhappy with sp2, in fact it was bad enough to me (it shot my wagon and burned my mule!) that I am now pursuing other operating systems.
So to the author of this article, I say you are spot on.
The big deal is that you have to stop EVERYTHING the computer is doing, backup, and wait a minute or so. If you’re used to something which doesn’t ask you this then this easily ticks you off.
Out of the 50+ apps I have installed, only a 5th of the require a reboot. Hell, even some patches don’t require reboots anymore. And if you’re updating your machine or installing an app, it’s not likely you were in the middle of something anyway, unless you’re just one of those people who insist on trying to multi-task while updating your machine, simply because it is not supposed to be done taht way, giving you more talking points during your next anti-MS tirade.
There was never an out of the box experience for computer hardware/software. It’s still developing. There’s always hope but I feel that will never happen.
Yawn. Of course it’s all about ‘nerd’ personality, it can’t possibly be anything to do with too-perfect XP. Likewise a post berating nerds can never say anything about the author’s personality, right?
> Oh come on, do you even rembember Windows 3.1?
> It sucked NUTS. It was pure crap. All drivers
> had to be installed through DOS, since it was
> just a GUI wrapper for it.
Apparantly better than you! While yes, you did have to do that for CD-ROMS, if you had a decent (which back then meant hardware set, like the SB Pro or early SB-16) sound card, you didn’t have to touch DOS to install the windows drivers to use it. (ah, the days BEFORE blaster strings since you could only have two IRQ’s and the ports were fixed) Once you got it booted in a working video card driver, you could switch to another driver without once touching the command line, often without even rebooting…
And installing applications meant for Windows 3.1 was a billion times simpler than installing a new application under linux. They just worked. (ok, they just hung… A lot… but that’s not what I’m pointing at). I didn’t have to dick around with the command line to install office 2.0 or King’s Quest VI, nor did I have to go hunting for the install directory and the executable just to run them. While YES, they are making steps in that direction given the rate of progress I’ve seen in linux the past 8 years… I’d say that from a user standpoint a desktop linux distro consistantly lags a decade behind the Mac and Windows on the simplest (and generally important) area of software and driver installation.
Which of course is why they pack damn near every concievable app into the distro – I’d be willing to bet all those distro’s would see anywhere near as much success if they didn’t come with so many applications pre-installed – Because installing a program yourself is a total nightmare by comparison.
Which again is the Free Software can do no wrong, Microsoft is evil nonsense. Every ‘name’ linux distro includes by default a suite of programs but if M$ does that they are being ‘unfair’ and every fanboy on the planet would be screaming far and wide about it – and frankly, I’m sick of it. It is this very attitude that has been pushing me away from considering linux as a viable alternative for… well, anything.
Hell, I’m thinking of ditching it on servers for some other flavor of *nix – not because it’s not doing the job but because of the fanboy attitude of linux supporters. It’s not like there aren’t plenty of others (freeBSD, QNX, Darwin, Solaris, etc) and not like Apache, Samba or any of the dozen other services function differently on them.
> nor did I have to go hunting for the install directory
> and the executable just to run them.
That should be program directory, and should mention that’s AFTER running the installer. The simple fact installers MADE program groups and put lauch icons in them (and removal icons) is years ahead of most linux desktops in functionality.
In fact, that’s a functionality we’re just seeing in linux what, THIS PAST YEAR? (with a handful of distro’s like Lindows accepted of course – but it often sounds like they are about as popular with the Linux community as Bill Gates it seems)
“activation is not marketing. its a tool to defeat thieves. the only people that take exception to safes, door locks, car alarms, license codes, activation, etc., tend to be thieves”
I disagree entirely. Thieves worked out how to get around product activation before Windows XP was released and continue to have ways around it. The only people irritated by activation are legitimate users.
Activation has not reduced piracy, but has increased legitimate user frustration. It really is an absurdly stupid feature.
That M$ hasn’t taken said creation of groups and icons WAY too far (LOL) – We get what, three or four shortcuts total to new programs at times? Dear god is the start menu too complex for the average user? (YES)
I’ll shut up now. Promise.
“Activation has not reduced piracy, but has increased legitimate user frustration. It really is an absurdly stupid feature.”
actually you do not know what you are talking about.
activation has stopped casual piracy in a major way. its not designed to stop master hackers and criminal organizations bent on stealing software. it stops people from violating a license and installing it on 10 pcs in a small office….or 3 pcs in a home.
it works so well, almost all major commercial software vendors have duplicated the methods to increase their sales.
activation is an incredible return on the investment in licensing of the technology from third parties or the cost of developing. it increases sales more than any marketing campaign designed to drive new sales.
if you were a little more familiar with the business of selling commercial software you would not say such ill informed things.
@matt
> Activation has not reduced piracy, but has increased
> legitimate user frustration. It really is an absurdly
> stupid feature.
Just as crooks find ways around safes, locks and car alarms. There’s a joke in police work for door locks – “They aren’t there to stop real criminals, just to keep the honest people honest. Your average doorlock is not going to slow down a hardened crim any more than it would a bulldozer.”
You really think your front door lock would stop a 3 time convicted felon from B&E? You have a front door lock anyways… why? To keep out the people who are not willing to take the time, effort, or risk of breaking the door in or picking the lock. That is what M$ activations are.
God forbid M$ tries to put a lock on it. Yes, cracking the OS to make copies is commonplace, but how much more so would it be without it? If anyone could do it out of box with no precautions? I cannot fault them for something so simple that you can hit ‘accept’ to and continue with a minimum of effort.
That’s a lot less hassle than trying to find the right key in the dark stumblin in at 2AM from a major bender.
Having XP SP2 break things is the same as when apt-get upgrade and emerge –update world/system breaks things.
@Devon
Don’t get me wrong, Im no Microsoft fan, and I run Linux as my primary OS at home..
I’m curious to why you had to preface your comments with that statement. Are you afraid of fanboys or something?
i had already downloaded the windows xp svc pk 2 network/admin installer
266MB download that will update any type of xp configuration….home or pro at any state of updating…without svc pk 1, with it, with every update up to svc pk 2, etc.
i just moved it across my network to a fully updated windows xp pro svc pk 1a machine
the machine is running zone alarm firewall 5.1.011, spybot search and destroy 1.3, pivx qwik-fix pro, and has symantec corp av 8 on it. all fully up to date. i will not have the security center monitoring this stuff…that functionality is already taken care of.
one thing many people fail to mention is the protection ms builds into xp: system restore and rollback wich work very well. svc pk 2 sets a restore point and backs up all files that are being altered. in case something goes wrong, in a few quick clicks you can revert to where you were prior to the update.
to install you doubleclick and acknowledge the backup of files and location and then off it goes…
install took 22 minutes on an amd athlon 2100+, with geforce 4 mx 400 with 64mb vid ram, 256mb pc2100 system ram, and 40gb 7200rpm 8mb cache hard drive ata 100. pc with those specs was bought in may of 2002 (29 months ago) with 19″ crt and 3 yr warranty for $1300. whole office of them and not one has ever crashed or had any security breach.
when done it gave me dialog box to either reboot or keep working. i could choose to do other things but that would be pretty dense. i did not have any other applications running while the install took place. i chose to restart.
upon reboot i logged in as usual…i have all pcs set to use control-alt-delete to bring up login screen and put in user name and password at all reboots and logouts. user name field is forced blank as well. bootup took longer than normal as new settings were applied. “administrator” and “guest” accounts have been renamed and disabled where appropriate via group policy.
goes straight to desktop with security center window open. did not ask me if i wanted to turn on firewall as it detected zone alarm fine. it does pop up balloon from sys tray with alert about automatic updates and av software. it can sense symantec av corp 8 but does not know if it is up to date….i will choose to monitor this in another way so i turn off monitoring.
i likewise do not allow ms or xp to fully automate updates. i turn off the monitoring of this. updating is handled by other means.
i use the google toolbar/popup blocker with ie 6 so no need to use new ie 6 pop up blocker.
open ie, go to tools/internet options/privacy tab/ uncheck pop up blocker.
done. nothing to it. all works great. no more pop ups. info bar will now drop down below address bar in ie 6 when downloads or installs of things try to occur.
pretty damn easy and pain free.
It seams that your problem with Linux mainly consists in that you try to run it on unsupported hardware. I agree this can be difficult to do out of the box.
The difference between Linux and windows is that you in Linux, if you are lucky and have the right skills, may get it to work anyway.
Windows doesn’t usually give you that option. You just have to go out and buy new hardware that fits your software and enjoy your simple installation.
Now, don’t tell me that there is no such thing as hardware not supported on various versions of windows. Examples my HPIIC scanner won’t work on win2k neither my Nokia 4046 19″ screen, it won’t install on disks connected my adaptec SCSI ultra160 card, my hp970 printer won’t print to its full capacity giving worse quality in photo printing than in Linux. All of wich this perfectly on Linux. As you can see
this is not strange brands of hardware or even strange models, but fairly common hardware.
Conclusion: if you want smooth installation check if the hardware fits the intended OS before you buy it. Follow
this rule regardless what OS you intend to use and your
life in front of your computer will be a lot simpler.
“That should be program directory, and should mention that’s AFTER running the installer. The simple fact installers MADE program groups and put lauch icons in them (and removal icons) is years ahead of most linux desktops in functionality.
In fact, that’s a functionality we’re just seeing in linux what, THIS PAST YEAR? (with a handful of distro’s like Lindows accepted of course – but it often sounds like they are about as popular with the Linux community as Bill Gates it seems)”
The idea of a program directory as Windows uses it is completely and utterly annoying. Most of the people I know prefer to change the default install directory, so that Games go into the GAMES directory, etc. The fact that there is no standard for it is annoying as well, For example, I can readily think of at least Ubisoft’s idiocy in installing either in C:Program FilesUBIsoft or C:Program FilesUBI Soft. Or some will just install them to C: like Neverwinter Nights did….
And too many icons on the desktop gets extremely annoying… Personally, I think the way the linux DE’s do it is FAR better. Click on a menu, go to Games, or Office, etc.
I have awlways hated how Windows makes program groups… you know instead of making Program Groups, as Linux does it…. windows just opens up a folder after installing it that has files that are associated with that Program… help files, etc. Example would be Silent Hill 4 which creates the in the start menu a link for System Check, to see if your computer will run the game, and a controller set up and then the actual game. Lame. Makes the UI quite uncomfortable in my opinion.
Gnome and KDE are light years beyond Win3.1, and for that matter Win95, Win98, and in many ways WinXP.
When apt-get upgrade breaks, it just means I can’t install the latest emacs for a couple of days until it get’s fixed. SP2 took out my friend’s internet connection. I’ve never had apt break something that affected critical system operation.
Well, that’s what (Windows-using) friends are for, right? To vet Microsoft upgrades so you know what’s safe to install on your computers at home?
The simple fact installers MADE program groups and put lauch icons in them (and removal icons) is years ahead of most linux desktops in functionality.
1) Program groups are a pain in the ass, cluttering up your menu. Developers who use program groups overestimate their importance. A stupid FTP client doesn’t need an entire directory full of shortcuts…
2) APT has been handling my menu properly for years. I’ll be so glad when I can point newbies to proper APT-based distros. Hopefully, Ubuntu and UserLinux will become popular enough that these silly “Linux problems” caused by a lack of APT will disappear.
What is it with people arguing psychology and sociology on this board? This is a tech forum. Nobody gives a flip about your theories on “nerd sociology” or on why “Linux/Windows/Mac zealots” behave the way they do.
Let me repeat: this is a *technology* board. Talk technology, or keep your thoughts to yourself!
No offense, but you obviously dind’t read.
Shortcuts, automatic, ANY shortcut. For a new package. I don’t care where it puts it. On the menu, on the desktop, in a “program group” (which is the same #@$5ing thing as the menu people!) Whatever. At least Windows DOES that.
You install a piece of software not custom built for distro from a RPM – DOES IT DO THAT? HELL NO.
Only recently (past year, year and a half) have any distro’s even made attempts at this functionality – Right now only two or three that actually do that come to mind (Lindows for example).
Otherwise, you have to hunt for the blasted executable (which is so WONDERFULLY marked as such) and set the shortcut up yourself. This is something the average user cannot manage… unless of course they do it by accident in windows creating fifty shortcuts on their desktop to the My Documents folder (LOL) or by missing the Recycle Bin.
Oh, so “you’ve” never had apt break anything critical for you, so I guess it never happens. XP SP2 installed flawlessly for me, so I guess XP SP2 is flawless.
It is the nature of APT not to break critical system functionality. The Debian packagers are just too careful for that. I know lot’s of Debian users, and have run Debian for a long time, and I’ve never had it break something as important as networking. A scientific study? No, but it’s a general sentiment I’ve observed. The general sentiment about SP2, however, is that it breaks things on many systems.
In any case, in my own experience with Windows Update tells me that updates breaking networking are not unheard of. It happened to several of my own computers when I was foolish enough to leave auto-update on. Between Windows Update and APT on the computers I’ve used them on, the record favors APT.
You install a piece of software not custom built for distro from a RPM – DOES IT DO THAT? HELL NO.
Well, there is your problem. Don’t do that! If a piece of software isn’t compiled for the specific distribution in question, then it’s hit-or-miss at best. That’s not a Linux problem, but a distribution problem.
When you complain about Linux applications not installing menu entries properly, you sound silly to those who actually use Linux on a dialy basis. We know that the proper way to install software is to use your distro’s repository. Since that leads to mostly trouble-free installs, we can’t understand where your complaints are coming from.
Once again, that’s just your experience and some anecdotes. I’m well aware that XP SP2 has caused problems for many people, but so has apt and emerge.
Regarding your response to deathshadow…that’s part of the problem with linux in that your limited to your distros repository. Actually, I find that more of a developer problem than anything else. If you’re a developer and have your software on some web site, then you’re screwed with regards to the dependency problem unless you setup your own repository..unless i’m missing something and if you download some random deb, the installer will automagically go out and try and retrieve dependencies for you.
Personal , for me all OS’s are tools.It’s rather annoying
to see the discussion heading after a few posts for the Linux against MS direction.I agree with Anonymous Anonymous (IP: —.chvlva.adelphia.net) that it isn’t so difficult to sharpen Windows XP (Professional).I would rather like to see that implemented in Sp2, to much default settings which aren’t used is a sec flaw.For a wealthy company as Microsoft undoubtedly is, the implementation of all the tricks and settings from eg:XP-anti spy,XP-Clean-Free,local policy settings in different flavors ,unnecessary services,(easy,medium,paranoid,),couldn’t be
so hard.I use XP to rip dvd’s and make my own Dolby digital 5.1 (music) dvd’s , and to occasional play a single player game.For All other purposes i rather like to use my unix boxes ( Linux,etc).Xp is very strong as a multi media and gaming platform.Whereas Linux has the better e-mail and browsers, is more secure , because for eg :it
doesn’t treat file suffixes as windows does (they don’t mean so much to Linux).If a specific file is executable or not depends in Linux on the acl’s (file permissions)
rather than in Windows on the file extensions like (.exe),(.com),(.ini) etc.
For me an Operating System is a tool, and it has to get “the job “done.
To get back on track, SP2 isn’t so bad, people who have looked around in the OSS kitchen know how difficult it is to protect certain pages in memory
(preferably not only the stack but the heap as well) while maintaining system stability and usability really like the NX-bit feature in SP2 i hope though
that it isn’t as broken as the /GS in Windows server 2003.I would like to see a more more modular approach to “safety”from Microsoft.People who have a specific need mostly know what services should be active in order to run file sharing etc.There’s absolutely no need for unnecessary services like windows for networks,
netbios over tcp/ip, printer and file sharing,remote registry to be running in by
default.Like most OSS OS’s this can pretty well be steered with dependencies.Furthermore it would be a pleasure to be savored when during installation one had the opportunity to decide whether to install some features and or applications like windows media player,ms outlook, ms messenger (question: why does messenger 6.2
have a adware ?).I think the problem is certainly not the developers not being capable enough , but there’s to much unhealthy force from the suit brigade and marketing trolls
on technical reimplementation where they should only provide the right environment
to develop something more apropiate to use and maintain instead of interfering to much
with for them irrelevant matters.
In the end there’s allways a weak subtraction of what could have been.
Upstream Developer’s point of view:
Provide source code for your application, post it on your application’s website or any open source portal. Finish
Distribution Developer’s point of view:
Write installation scripts for the Upstream developer’s application. Add the package to distro’s repository. Fine tune the installation of the package for distro. Finish
User’s point of view:
Search your distro’s repository for package. Distro provides powerful tools to do all that. Install the package from your distro’s repo. If package isn’t in repo, whine, complain, submit bug report to distro maintainer/devs or even search distro’s bugzilla. If distro rocks, Distro maintainers add packages to distro.
Distros that rock:
Debian based distros (access to 15000 packages)
Gentoo based distros (access to 10000 packages)
Distros that Give Linux install a horrible reputation:
Many reputable Commercial and RPM distros still playing catch up.
Conclusion:
Users going on random websites to install unprotect packages is not only silly, it is dangerous, insecure and a broken concept. Because Windows does it doesn’t mean that it is right. In fact, there are just a few things Windows those right, and installing software isn’t one of them.
Yes, it’s anecdotal evidence, but that’s the best anybody has at the moment. All I know is that lot’s of Windows users are complaining about SP2 breaking things, while if you browse Debian’s mailing lists, you won’t see lot’s of people complaining about APT breaking things.
With regards to the “developer problem,” I see it as more of an engineering trade-off than a weakness. The fine-grained dependency tracking model of software management allows developers to ship more modularized software, and to take better advantage of code-reuse. Beyond that, it allows a much more friendly user-interface to software installation than even what Windows and Mac provide. I mean, wouldn’t “Add/Remove Programs” in Windows be so much more useful if you could use it to actually Add programs from a list, instead of just removing them?
This flexibility is traded-off against the requirement for central coordination of the repository. In my opinion, such a trade-off is sensical for Linux right now, because the vast majority of it’s software is open source, and can be maintained in this manner. In the future, if closed-source software becomes a bigger player in Linux, this assumption might have to be rethought.
Mystilleef is correct. joe sixpack, his mom and his sis surf here and there, installing this and that from here and there and before you know it they have cursors that spy and keys that are stroked.
apt-get and emerge are great systems for keeping your systems up to date, but as you stated when linux becomes more popular and more proprietary software is introduced things will get more complicated.
Just throwing out some ideas…it would be interesting if some added functionality could be grafted onto apt or emerge, such as where if you install some random deb, ebuild, whatever that the installer would go out and get the dependencies as stated in the package. It would also be interesting to have a fallback solution where if a dependency couldn’t be found in a standard repository that a distributed search (bittorrent) could be used to search, download, and install needed dependencies. Even big deb, gentoo repositories don’t always have older or bleeding edge libs.
You can also add repositories for stuff not in your distro. Which is how software should be distributed. The idea of downloading a package and installing it is so 90’s. I don’t want to manually check for updates, re-download, and re-install all of the time. If I get a repository instead of a file it is all done for me, two clicks. This is the new evolution of software distribution: you don’t get a file good for one use, you get information telling your computer how to get that file good for all future uses.
For example mplayer is not in debian’s package list. So what do I do? I don’t go to mplayer’s site and download a package. I go to mplayer’s site and see that under projects they have a debian repository lists. I add to my list and let apt do the rest. All future upgrading is done for me, I never have to deal with maintaining this package again. It is really nice. I would not go back to concept of downloading files again if someone paid me.
Well, the security implications of randomly searching out software on the internet are a bit scary, to say the least.
I don’t see proprietory software being a significant modification to the basic apt/yum model. Both already support things like CD-ROM repositories. It would be a rather simple trick to use HAL in such a way that it detected an inserted CD, prompted for the root password, and temporarily added the CD-ROM to the set of available repositories. Then, the user could install packages just like they always have. Or, if distributors wanted to host their software online, they could set up an APT or Yum repository, and give the buyer a unique, authenticated URL they could add to their apt.sources. That way, the software would not only be easy to install, but could be updated automatically using the same mechanisms the user uses to update all his/her software.
What’s needed from Apt/Yum, technically, is a friendlier interface to adding repositories (eg: a browser plug-in that would let the user click on a special link to add a repository), and better versioning so third-party repositories are held at a lower priority than main repositories.
“Users going on random websites to install unprotect packages is not only silly, it is dangerous, insecure and a broken concept. Because Windows does it doesn’t mean that it is right. In fact, there are just a few things Windows those right, and installing software isn’t one of them. ”
Installing packages which integrity can’t be checked is indeed
not a smart move to make.
“Distros that rock:
Debian based distros (access to 15000 packages)
Gentoo based distros (access to 10000 packages)
Distros that Give Linux install a horrible reputation:
Many reputable Commercial and RPM distros still playing catch up.”
Well this isn’t very objective don’t you think likewise?
It depends on what gets the job done.Although i personally
favor SuSE , also has an impressive amount of packages.
More packages that i could possible understand in a Lifetime.On occasion if there’s not that favorite one included first thing i would check is wether Sourceforge has it ,or the maintainer has it’s own packages somewhere else.
The fact that some Distros resembles Microsoft in a way
of GUI interpretation shouldn’t classify it as horrible or bad.
Personally i like a good implemented gui , which makes me
more productive in my opinion.Others might want complete freedom and prefer LFS.No problem with that choice .
“Many reputable Commercial and RPM distros still playing catch up.”
They don’t play they actually make a living and try to survive.What’s wrong with making money out of selling Linux distros and giving impressive support.I remember an article
lately where a computational center made a cluster from
>200 xenon 3.4 and 196 xenon 2.4 . on top of SuSE enterprise linux.They can’t call some distro when something
goes wrong and hear on the answering machine: “Sorry can’t help you the package maintainer is on vacation”.
That’s why it’s so nice there’s so much under the OSS Sun (heh sry).For every one there’s a niche.
Well this isn’t very objective don’t you think likewise?
I think mystilleef is speaking about package management. As much as I like RedHat, they are responsible for the term “RPM hell,” and took *way* too long to get a proper package management tool in their distro. Since many peoples’ first exposure to Linux was via RedHat, this created a significant negative impression that didn’t need to happen. To this day, Fedora has not totall solved the problem — Yum is flaky, slow, and doesn’t ship with a GUI by default. Not cool.
They don’t play they actually make a living and try to survive.What’s wrong with making money out of selling Linux distros and giving impressive support
Again, I think the statement was more about package management than general usage. SuSE and RedHat are great distributions, but their late arrival to the package management game left a lot of bad-tastes in peoples’ mouths who had to deal with RPM-hell. Even today if SuSE’s and RedHat’s repositories were as complete and well-maintained as Debian’s, there likely would not be quite as many complaints about package management on Linux. Sure, there would be some, but 15,000+ packages is enough to ensure that you’ve met the needs of 90% of all users.
Regarding Linux/*BSD/*NIX and the driver suckage factor. Just a question, as I understand it there is a group implementing NDIS on Linux and a number of BSD’s; has anyone thought of implementing the WDM driver API? I’m not clued in too much about the Linux/Windows kernels, however, would it be possible to do that? even if it were just for the x86 version?
Out of the 50+ apps I have installed, only a 5th of the require a reboot.
Which?
Hell, even some patches don’t require reboots anymore.
“Some”. Ofcourse “some” patches don’t require a reboot. A lot do though. Why the hell should a system reboot because a browser patch got installed? Why the hell should a system reboot more than 1 time when you install patches?
And if you’re updating your machine or installing an app, it’s not likely you were in the middle of something anyway, unless you’re just one of those people who insist on trying to multi-task while updating your machine, simply because it is not supposed to be done taht way
Ofcourse a system is supposed to multi-task! We’re not living in the DOS age anymore. Unless you’re updating a kernel or driver it should not reboot and given Windows NT has a microkernel design it should be able to update a driver without requiring a reboot.
In a professional environment you don’t want to stop working. Its anti-productive. We’re not even talking about workstations only anyway. Ever even had to admin a Windows server? Downtime because of a patch is not done and ridiculous. It should be evaded as much as possible.
Like Rayiner, correctly pointed out, I didn’t mean to say commercial Linux distros suck, I was specifically talking about package management under many commercial Linux distros, especially the RPM based ones.
Compared to the community based distros, the assumption is that commercial linux distros should be ahead of the game with regards to package management, system administration and software installation. Quite the contrary, they are woefully behind.
I haven’t used RPM or any binary based distro since they last screwed my setup some years ago (I test every now and then but haven’t used any seriously yet). But I remember back then, RPMs were the reasons I almost gave up on Linux and the reason I still use source based distros to this day.
Today, the only people who complain about RPM hell, library dependency hell and installation hell on linux are those who mostly use RPM based distros. Or those who use a distro with no package manager at all. So, I still get the vibe that the problem hasn’t really been fixed on the RPM end.
This has nothing to do with making money, or support, or service. What I’m accusing these distros of are:
1). a weak repository with small number of packages
2). poor or totally non-existent dependency resolution
3). poor or totally non-existent means or removing software
4). inability of a user to install different versions of the same packages on the same system
5). inability to upgrade the system without having to download 4 gigabyte CDROMs/DVDROMs every X weeks
6). scattered/non-centralized/non-standard repositories.
This is a real problem, even today, for many RPM distros. While distros that use apt or portage or ports have long been oblivious of these issues. To make matters worse, some corporations are lobbying to make RPM a LSB standard! That’s if it isn’t already.
Red Hat, SUSE, Mandrake are great distros, but I wish I’d never hear their users complain about RPM hell, dependency hell and installation hell. Or watch them go around the internet hunting for RPMs. It just shows something is fundamentally wrong.
I have nothing against Red Hat, SUSE or whatever. Heck I buy many of their CDs/DVDs even though I don’t use them, primarily because of their contributions to Desktop Linux.
Ofcourse a system is supposed to multi-task! We’re not living in the DOS age anymore. Unless you’re updating a kernel or driver it should not reboot and given Windows NT has a microkernel design it should be able to update a driver without requiring a reboot.
Actually, Windows NT isn’t a microkernel, in the beginning, sure, it was microkernelish, but Microsoft decided that performance should be the ultimate aim, and not trying to create a technologically superior operating system.
With that being said, however, there is no need to reboot the computer for many things, and alot of the time, the problem isn’t with Windows, but with crappy driver producers who don’t take advantage of the features that Windows offers to driver developers.
I can install a driver for my video card without the need to reboot, same goes for many USB devices. Just because the “wizard” demands a reboot doesn’t mean that that you HAVE to reboot, all it means is that driver vendor was too bloody lazy to update the drivers to take advantage of the features available to them which removes the need to continuously reboot after each driver installation.
Before bitching about the Great Out of the Box Experience with Windows XP SP2, mabe this writer needs to try any Distro of Linux…. He would see that Windows is not that bad…
That’s a stupid argument. Just because something is better than the competition, doesn’t make it good.
As far as I can tell, Microsoft did it right with SP2.
Speaking about manually downloading SP2: did he just tell us he disabled Windows Updates? How the heck he would expect a security patch or service pack to arrive to his computer automatically?
Look, if we ignore silly rant about need to wait for a patch to download, what is left?
A license? Well, I know many software projects that changed their license in the process, and other than few die hard developers-contributors, nobody cared!
A pop-up telling you to have Windows Updates enabled? Man, if you do not know how to turn it off forewer (hint: click-click-click-done)- then you deserve it. I could even say: keep Windows Updates on, you are one of those who needs it.
I have also observed that in the last 10 or so days one of the major chains of computer stores had Norton Antivirus sold out on their Web page. Yes, imagine that! To make sure it is not just a single case- I checked Amazon.com and NAV 2005 was the top item in software bestsellers at that time.
Imagine that: security pop-ups work! People suddenly realize they need antivirus, and go get it! Some of them, shock and horror!, may actually enable Windows Updates, and let their computer have working firewall first time in their computer life. He calls it spam???
Finally, that is only transition period, and transition is never painless. Expect computers with Win XP SP2 in all major outlets soon, if not now.
That’s a stupid argument. Just because something is better than the competition, doesn’t make it good.
Agreed. One thing alot of people are failing to realise is this; what is perfect for one person could be horrible for another. For example, I like the defaults of MacOS X, very unintrusive. Same goes for FreeBSD mini-iso. I download the base system, I cvsup the ports then download and install only the desktop/X11 parts I want.
Yes, Windows XP can piss people off, but with that being said, however, I am sure when they did their “focus group” they found that the way they’ve setup Windows XP suits the majority of users out there.
What people here also need to realise is the fact that people like us, namely those who spend time at IT orientated sites, do not make up the volume of end users, we represent only a VERY small amount of the over all market, I’d say around 5-10%, the fact we’re pissed off will not change a damn thing. When +50% of people start complaing THEN you’ll see Microsoft take notice, but the fact is, until end users vote with their wallets, Microsoft rightfully assumes that they’re onto a good thing – how else can a business make an assumption? they make a product, people buy it, obviously they’ve made a product that users want.
I can understand having to reboot for OS updates, it’s a bit of a pain but I can live with it. As other people have pointed out; you’re meant to shut down all applications when you install an upgrade anyway. But it really bugs me when basic apps insist on restarting my PC, especially when they don’t give any warning that it’ll be necessary. I’ve had a few apps that automatically close all other apps and restart during the installation process, without even giving you a chance to cancel the install.
Uninstalling apps can be just as bad. I’ve been clearing some of the shareware apps from my secondary PC (mainly used to test software), things like image editors, MP3 taggers, Internet utilities and games. A ridiculous number of them required the system to be restarted to complete the uninstall. Overall I had to restart my system 5 or 6 times to uninstall around 20 apps. Those apps probably required a restart when they were installed too. It’s pretty ridiculous, especially when similar apps in other operating systems wouldn’t require a restart.
havent read all posts so this may have already been mentioned
“The security reminder is a way for Microsoft to make more money. Any app I want to distribute over the Internet pops up this ominious sounding message to end users when they try to install it. The only way for me to avoid this is to buy a certificate proving that my download is “trusted”, thus avoiding the pop-up warning. The certificates are NOT cheap.”
even MS software pops this up when its downloaded certificates have nothing to do with it.
I wish you all would just shut the hell up!
This is a FREEE update from Microsoft which includes MANY enhancements. The reason it is so big is because they recompiled most of the code with thier new compilers so as to catch as many mistakes as possible, among MANY other things.
You complain when Microsoft actually does something wrong, and then you cmoplain when they do get it right… just shut the hell up. I am so sick of you trolls out there.
But they have all failed to make up an excuse for secuity flaws beeing used to force users to “accept” license changes. That alone is bad enough to dwarf the rest,
Legal issues of DOUBLE license agreement IS very important (read “BAD”) for Microsoft/customer relationship. The main part of agreement is DISCLAIMER of the usefullness and reliability of M$ products. So (1)customer has to pay ;(2) has no rights to complain (3) has the obligation to accept NEXT license agreement from M$. MS is (1) be paid (2) has no obligations (3) has the rights to CHANGE at any time the terms of first license agreement by issuing (its )errors’ SP.
Where are the law/code(s) for the customer protection?
Can You imagine (usefullness, security, health) DISCLAIMER on a can by PEPSI-cola? Can You imagine – when You find that can of pepsi contained a POISON that may damage You, PEPSI will issue an anti-poison AND Pespi force You to sign a new license agreement before use it?
What is wrong with America?
I’m sorry, just because a company decides that they want to change their licensing terms, and VERY VERY slightly, does not make them bad.
You are not forced to accept the terms either. you don’t like it, don’t install it. There is nothing wrong with the current licensing agreement.
> This is a FREEE update from Microsoft which includes MANY enhancements.
Microsoft is not free.
I’m sorry, but there is more change between XP w/ SP1 to XSPSP2 than there was for Win98SE, which was launched as a new OS that you had to pay for.
XPSP2 is essentially a major overhaul of XP and there was no charge for it.
…is the anti-piracy. my boyfriend runs a pirated copy of XP. whatever, it’s his choice, and i’m not gonna just rip it out of there and install Linux or something. but he’s running it on my flipping home network, and I want my damn networks to be secure. thanks to MS’s decision to turn a security patch into an anti-piracy tool, I can’t secure my network, and I have to firewall that box off like the redheaded stepchild of the local network family. they want to detect that it’s pirated and bug him to go buy a real copy? heck, they want to detect that it’s pirated and send a report to the FBI? go ahead. it’s their right. but if they’re serious about security they should realise it’s a *fact of life* that hundreds of thousands, or millions, of people are running illegal copies of XP, and the internet isn’t going to have a hope in hell of being secure unless MS allows them to be patched.
BTW, Tom, just about any 802.11b wireless card you can name will run out of the box on new Linux distributions. 802.11g is nastier. But it’s the old story with Linux – it’s not anything Linux developers can help. It’s entirely the hardware providers’ fault. They write drivers for Windows. They don’t even release the specs to their hardware to facilitate the writing of Linux drivers, much less write them themselves. Is it any wonder it takes Linux hackers a few months to reverse-engineer the hardware and develop a driver?
“rpm is broken”.
no, it’s not. if rpm is broken, so’s dpkg. you have apt-get, so you don’t use dpkg all the time. I have urpmi, so I don’t use rpm. Try actually checking whether RPM distros do what you suggest before bashing them…because they do.
“We are talking the equivalent of Kernel, Driver, Firewall and even possibly a new TCP/IP stack (if you haven’t already installed the ipV6 patch) without ever seeing the command line or anything more complex than “[Back] [Next] [Cancel]” If new versions of all of the above came out in linux, with lets say a new desktop manager and a new version of XFree, how many of you can say you’ve been able to uprate all at once sucessfully from one installer, without after hours of dicking with dependancies on the command line resort to burning out a full version of the latest distro and using that instead?”
Yup. I can. I run Mandrake Cooker. I update using urpmi –auto-select, but I could just as easily use rpmdrake (the GUI tool) and it’s “all upgradeable packages” filter. I’ve updated my kernel, GNOME, XFree (heck, I switched to X.org) and firewall (shorewall), ooh, must be ten or more times each since I last did a clean install of the OS. It takes two commands. urpmi.update -a, then urpmi –auto-select -v. all done. no reboots, unless the kernel got updated.
Wireless setup and use on FreeBSD, though, is simply a breeze. If you have a NIC based on the Atheros or Prism chipsets, all you do is load a couple of kernel modules, then use ifconfig to configure SSID, channel, WEP, etc. Very scriptable.
As for Windows, the default setup will never satisfy everybody. There’s just no way. Which is why there are confiration settings, a control panel, and so forth. It’s your software, take the time to make it look / run the way you want it to. Spend less time bitching, and more time learning (probably the biggest problem in the world today is the absolute lack of desire to learn anything by the majority of the general public).
Now, complaining about how hard MS makes it to configure things the way you want, and not the way they think you should have it, that’s a legitimate complaint.
Mandrake is a nice distro.The 10.1 Community has besides
Selinux RSBAC in the kernel.I would like to see more documentation from them about how to turn the damn thing on:-)
RSBAC isn’tinitialized during the boot process.
@mojojojo627 your exactly the kind of idiot I was talking about. And by the way, my computer is better than yours!
I have a newer version of your mobo, the A7N8X-E-DX. It’s also nforce2, with onboard networking (two ports, 100Mbit and gigabit), onboard SATA, onboard Soundstorm audio etc. I installed MDK 10.1 on it a week ago. Everything worked – both network ports, the onboard sound, the SATA, everything. No patches, no nothing. Just Worked. I installed the nvidia driver and was laughing. The only thing that was a pain was 5.1 audio – for some reason, using native ALSA output screws it up. Using OSS emulation it works perfectly, though (my new Star Wars box set sounds great :>). I’m going to raise this with the ALSA folks.
“That should be program directory, and should mention that’s AFTER running the installer. The simple fact installers MADE program groups and put lauch icons in them (and removal icons) is years ahead of most linux desktops in functionality.”
What? seriously, are you on crack? Every distro made in the last five years at *least* has added menu entries for any package you install properly (i.e., through the distro’s packaging system). Do you get an icon if you install from source or a non-distro package? No. Do you get an icon on Windows if you get some program as a zip file with an .exe in it? No. Use the right system, get the right result.
crap, will you stop it with the RPM bashing?
Mandrake’s package base is huge; not quite as huge as Debian’s, but huge nevertheless. I don’t have an exact package count handy, but it takes two DVDs to hold the whole set of main+contrib+commercial+jpackage stuff.
“Just throwing out some ideas…it would be interesting if some added functionality could be grafted onto apt or emerge, such as where if you install some random deb, ebuild, whatever that the installer would go out and get the dependencies as stated in the package.”
I don’t know if apt-get does that (my guess is yes), but urpmi does. The problem comes if the dependencies are in a different form (Red Hat’s package names are different from Mandrake’s, for e.g., so a Red Hat dependency probably won’t work on Mandrake) or simply if the dependencies aren’t there.
oh, and your idea of searching other repositories is ridiculous. The point of a repository is to be a set of packages that are known to work with each other. If an install tool is going to go grabbing packages from random other repositories just because they happen to fulfill dependencies, you defeat the whole purpose of the system. Repositories, package management tools and the dependency system are all components of a larger system, they’re not individual things you can or should abuse arbitrarily to shoehorn software onto a system.
Yes I am an adult, I don’t see any need for you to take my comment as a personal attack on you and respond in kind. We’re all friends here :0D
It didn’t take me a week of constant deep thought and pondering to figure out how to end the bubble spam, it took me a week to get fed up enough to spend the time (which was a major point of the article, time) to make it stop. Initially, it was annoying, but not thatannoying, but after a week of it I decided that enough was enough and two minutes later the problem was solved.
CPUGuy, you are right to the point. Microsoft can’t please everyone and you will allways find people bitching about everything they do.
It’s not about Microsoft product, it’s about Microsoft as a compagnie. Just because you don’t like Microsoft does not mean that they do crap product.
Live happy with your Linux/OS X/Other OS. Don’t troll on something you probably don’t use (OR prefer that your friends don’t know that you’re using it!!!).
Living with Windows XP SP2 is not HELL. Mabe it is for some, but I do suspect that it’s a minority.
I agree about virtualizing the filesystem (is it two words?) even further. However, these are already in the works. WINFS, Storage, Spotlight & smart folders (admittedly the latter is related, but not completely the same.) This all fits into a broader picture of a computer that is “aware” of what it is processing in the capacity a computer can be aware. Building bridges between data is exciting, and I hope to see projects like Dashboard, WINFS, storage, et al. succeed beyond our wildest imaginations. I like the overlap of concrete, and virtualized paradigms for interacting with data. The traditional UNIX paradigm where everything can be thought of as an object, and where a string of objects acting together can get work done is a beautiful idea. Each object has its place and does one thing very well. BUT working on this level is not appropriate for all jobs. That’s why having a computer that is capable of pulling seamless paradigm shifts (like using iTunes) is a vastly more useful tool. WHICH LEADS me to my next point.
I disagree with your assertion that the command line needs to be done away with. I believe you meant to say that we need better GUI tools to configure our systems. Agreed. However, I will take to task what was said explicitly. Having a command line is a good tool for some operations, a poor tool for others. Let it stay for what it’s good at. However, I think that we are saying essentially the same thing.
(This was an exercise of stream of consciousness. It may be roughly written.)
“I’m going to raise this with the ALSA folks.”
rofl, good luck with that
Regarding filesystems: Yes, Microsoft is taking some interesting directions with WinFS, etc. I’ve heard that WinFS won’t be shipping in Longhorn, though, so it remains to be seen how quickly this innovation will get to market. Don’t get me wrong. I hope it does. Just as I hope equivalent Linux technologies get to market.
One of the reasons that our operating systems are so complex is that we’ve basically exposed all of the gunk and grime beneath the surface to users — and we’ve pretended that that is a good thing. It isn’t. Users don’t want to know about filesystems. Users don’t want to know about how or where an app gets installed. Nor should they, unless they really, really want to know. I’m not talking about geeks. Geeks should always be able to drop down to a command-line and do what they want. All that most end users really want is a shiny icon on their desktop or start menu — and to just have it “work” when they ask it to. Consequently, what I’m suggesting is that we need to create a tiered (or virtualized) layer on top of today’s operating systems which completely abstracts away all of the grim that sits beneath it. This new logical namespace should be more approachable to users. More friendly. KDE and Gnome and Windows Shell and OSX shell are pretty good steps in that direction. But they still expose far too much gunk and grime.
Regarding command-line, I never advocated doing away completely with the command-line. I’m advocating making it unnecessary for the 99.99999% of users who don’t want to use it. And, no, I’m not talking about geeks or server admins. Those guys are pros (or hacks trying to be pros) — and they need a command-line to do their jobs. In order to make this possible, we need better GUIs. Windows manages far more of the cruft of its internals with GUIs than Linux. I know it’s boring but Linux devs are going to have to step up to the plate and provide these kinds of tools if they want Linux to level the playing field.
Just my two cents.
Wireless is a pain in the ass. I have an old Cisco Aironet wireless card. Cisco even provides the drivers. But they’re highly unstable on a SMP box (which I’ve got them installed on) — they crash or fail at inconvenient times. I could spend some time debugging them to figure out what’s wrong. But I don’t exactly have a lot of time on my hands between my job, grad school, working out, and having a life.
Yes, you’re right: The blame lies primarily with hardware manufacturers. But we’ve got to be realistic here: The market for wireless NIC cards running under Linux is practically non-existent. So we’ve got a chicken and egg problem here. In order get IHVs to invest in wireless Linux, either a market needs to exist — or they need to be convinced that seeding drivers will cause customers to create a market. Until that happens (and I mean really happens — 802.11g isn’t exactly a marginal technology), Linux will not capture the desktop.
The main part of agreement is DISCLAIMER of the usefullness and reliability of M$ products.
Show me better software license.
>(1)customer has to pay
True.
>(2) has no rights to complain
Not true. See OSNews discussion- people execute their right to complain up to 105%.
You can also complain to Microsoft directly.
You can also complain to authorities, and with some luck, few years later, you’ll get refunds in software discounts- and lawyers will get nice bonuses, thanks to you.
You can also complain to your government, and with some luck it’ll abandon Microsoft software in favour of something else.
>(3) has the obligation to accept NEXT license agreement from M$.
Not true. The button is there- you are not forced to click “Accept.”
>What is wrong with America?
Not too much. At least, less wrong than in Ukraine (my guess is you are associated with Ukraine) or Russia (where I am from) or even China.
Lets make our native countries as good as America before we start telling Americans how their life sucks, shall we?
I run both gnu/linux(slack) and windows XP. Windows XP(2000) is by far the best windows so far, it is the most stable. I do not know why people have so many problems with blue screen, spywhare, and adware.. they always use it as leverage against windows but it makes no sense. If you get spywhare and adware you area stupid user(how could you be using linux at all??). I haven’t ever gotten any of that stuff because its so easy to prevent if you know what you are doing. If you are average joe you just install everythign and anything. It is so obvious that if linux was the most popular OS right now, they would be screwed over with this stuff as well, only it is even easier to do so(people would find ways). I wonder if anybody here has ever even encountered(had been hacked) because of a security leak in IE or Windows.. I rather doubt it. Secondly, let firefox gain enough popularity and security bugs galore will show up(there is no bug-free software). I love linux and use it much more often then windows because it has what I need and gets the job done better, but I am not gonna deny that windows xp is still a very fine OS.
See, I don’t have the foggiest idea where these “Linux has bad out-of-box” experience complaints are coming from. When I installed SuSE 9.1, I noticed the following:
1) The installer itself was easier than XP’s, and it wasn’t generally very wordy.
2) All my hardware was detected off-the-bat. Installing proprietory drivers for my NVIDIA card and USB wlan dongle was a matter of clicking “Yes” when YaST prompted me. This was a big step ahead of Windows, where an install on my machine requires manually going to NVIDIA’s website, getting and installing the drivers, and setting my display to the proper resolution (which XP doesn’t do by default).
3) Software installation is a matter of firing up YaST, and clicking on the package I want. No need to even open a web browser.
4) The system came with most of the useful software I need already installed. No need to go through the usual rigamarole I do with a Windows install, which is to install WinZip, iTunes, and Outlook. Ark, JuK, and Kontact came already installed. No need to download a proper browser (Mozilla), because it already came installed. To those who think that this last step is an option, not a necessity, you’ve obviously never spent a Saturday morning cleaning out hundreds of spyware apps out of a friend’s computer…
So what’s the beef? Sure, if you’ve got no-name hardware, support on Linux might be a problem (leading to a bad out-of-box experience), but no-name hardware in Windows tends to be just as bad, only it causes crashes instead of just not working. If you treat a Linux machine like a Mac machine (ie: you take even the slightest precautions about making sure your hardware is supported), you shouldn’t have any real problems.
Thanks for all the feedback to my article. I posted a follow-up on my web site: http://kas.felinity.net/n21
The key point however is not that SP2 wasn’t an improvement over what we had before, it was that Microsoft can and must do better. If Linux is the key competitor, then competing on price (TCO) alone is a dead end, especially when the other product is essentially free. For Microsoft to be successful in this contest, they can either unleash the marketing people and lawyers, and hope for the best, or they can ensure that their product is far superior to its “free” alternative. “Windows is not that bad, and Linux is not that good,” as <italics>thjayo</italics> on OSnews put it, is not good enough. Windows carries a significant price tag, that now makes up a major portion of the cost of many new computers. As such it must deliver a significantly better experience than its competition to justify the price.