A Saturday Rant 6-28-2003
LINUX IS ON THE RISE
On Friday 27 June 2003 08:22 pm, John Culleton wrote:
> This article deals with a legal attack on Linux by a fading Unix company. I
> have used both SCO Unix and Linux. Linux is light years ahead.
>
> SCO could not have paid Linux a greater compliment. This is the ultimate
> slap suit.
The SCO action against IBM really rather old news. A lot of sound and fury is
being made over this by people who either don't know what they don't know, or
who have something to gain by their hoped-for demise of Linux.
Yet sane heads in business, academia, and government are not paying much
attention... they are going ahead and migrating away from proprietary
operating systems (Windows, Unix, Apple, etc.) in droves.
The SCO thing is a last-gasp attempt for an almost-dead company to extort
money from IBM and anyone else they can.... and many say that SCO is being
covertly supported by Microsoft.... to no one's surprise (at least not mine!)
Is Linux better than Windows? Depends on what you consider as "better." I
personally think it is... or else I would not use it. And as most of you
know, I've been using it for over a year now... running a typical business.
Everyone thinks you have to be an expert to use it. I don't know where they
get that. All of the major distributions (Red Hat, Mandrake, SuSE, etc.) come
with several desktop managers. I use KDE which looks like Windows, works like
Windows, and is more stable than Windows.
You can even get all the above disbributions free... but most will want to
get the CD and the manual... for a few bucks.
While most distributions of Linux will cost you about $50, the big benefit is
that all of them come with some 5,000 programs (no, you won't/don't have to
load them all!) ... most of them are as good or better than the expensive
Windows programs. And those that are not quite as good, are "good enough" for
most people. And they are free.
For example, Open Office "Writer" is not quite as slick as Word in that it
does not have all the zillions of whistles and bells that are stuffed into
the bloated MS program. And if you are writing a book on quantum physics with
huge formatting issues, Word might be what you want. But for letters, memos,
spreadsheets, powerpoint-like presentations, labels, and similar docs, OO
works just fine... and the interface looks very much like Office. Did I
mention that it's free?
If you gotta have Quark or Pagemaker or Photoshop then stick with Windows or
the Mac. But for my needs GIMP works just fine.
Linux comes with several web browsers, mail clients as well as a ton of
multi-media programs (midi, CD players, video viewers, etc.) Did I mention
that they are free?
I've only found one application that Linux does not have a "look-alike" for.
And for that one program (PC-Authorization: credit card
verification/transmission) I run a $60 Windows 98 emulator called Win4Lin, on
Linux. (It also lets me run ALL my Windows software... Quicken, Turbo Tax,
etc... but I only use it for PC-Auth.... and for PUB123... which won't be
necessary when web-based PUB456 is finished.... it's about 50% now!)
Free is good, but that's not the reason that I (or anyone else that I know
of) use Linux. We use it because it WORKS, it does not crash, and we are not
beholden to any vendor for expensive updates, patches, etc.
[al@localhost al]$ uptime
8:35pm up 24 days, 3:31, 1 user, load average: 0.32, 0.11, 0.06
[al@localhost al]$
How many of you have had your Win or Mac machine up for 24/7, 24 days
straight? And this is not a back-room server... it's a real-life, pound the
hell out of it, run-the-business, cat jumps on the keyboard,
wife-working-on-it, play solitaire, view-some-porn, send / recieve a fax,
listen to CDs, write a rant, draw a picture, look connect to digital camera,
....it's just gotta work all the time... machine (all done on an ancient
Gateway P2-450 w/ 384 MB memory).
Yeah, you have to take a bit of time to learn the Linux system, but 95% of it
is plain old point and click... just like Windows or the Mac. And the 5%
learning curve is pretty simple.... (and for many, probably not necessary.)
No matter what anyone might say, you never have to buy a virus program for
Linux or worry about such a thing. People say it's because the virus writers
go after the larger audience. What they don't tell you is that Linux (and Mac
OS X) is a hell of a lot more secure than Windows is simply by its design.
Believe me, most virus hackers have egos the size of the Grand Canyon... and
every one of them would like to go down in "history" as the one who was able
to bring down Linux. They try, but they can't do it. Linux is secure. There
have been a virus or two that attacked the Apache web server, but none that I
know of that ever brought down the Linux system... the way they hose Windows
machines on an almost weekly basis (What is it this week? Bugabear?)
I'm not a Linux zealot. I don't really care if you run Windows, Apple, or
Unix. You gotta use what works best for you and what you're most comfortable
with. But before you commit to Windows or the Mac for your next machine (or
latest upgrade) you ought to take a look at Linux.. It's also very simple to
do a "dual boot" where you install Linux along side Windows and have them
both. Go to the <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.redhat.com" target="_blank">www.redhat.com</a> page... or some of the tutorials at
<a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.mandrake.com" target="_blank">www.mandrake.com</a> and see what all the fuss is about.
If you are just starting out on a shoestring, you can get a $200 Linux
machine from WalMart have everything you need to run your publishing empire.
You gotta ask yourself something. Why is M$, SCO, and a whole host of others
doing all they can to see that Linux gets buried. There is a reason for it.
Because Linux is really good, it's free, and IT WORKS!
Did I mention that it's free?
Al Canton
Adams-Blake Company, Inc.
<a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.adams-blake.com" target="_blank">http://www.adams-blake.com</a>
PS: You're gonna say "How come you always preach that the 'high priced' item
is always better." Simple. In my experience, when it comes to human services
(doctors, lawyers, plumbers, programmers, book designers, speakers,
carpenters, electricians, entertainers, etc.,) that's been my experience.
With products it's a whole different story... and when it comes to computer
software, there is a huge amount of free and low-cost stuff that is either
better, just as good, or "good enough" to replace the overpriced stuff on the
shelf... that is made by "name" companies... sort of like the small press vs.
the New York houses. You get the picture.<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
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