[GLLUG] Semi-OT: Another BIG WinVista misstep

[Charles Ulrich]

On Thursday 10 May 2007 08:39, Michael Rudas wrote:
> Another big hole for the hackers to drive through...
>
> "Driver signing is a failure for Vista"
> <http://windowssecrets.com/comp/070510/#story1>
>
> ...yet I continue to hear "WinVista is the greatest thing since
> sliced bread!" from people that SHOULD know better.  I hope Linux is
> "ready for the masses" soon, or our entire computing infrastructure
> may collapse.

ESR seems to think so, and I mostly agree with him. He and Rob Landley 
(co-founder of Penguicon for those who don't know) authored a paper 
called World Domination 201 which outlines their reasoning behind the 
claim that Linux is poised for World Domination in 2008.

http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/world-domination/world-domination-201.html

They argue that 2008 will see the beginning of the end of 32-bit 
processors. But despite having years to prepare, 64-bit Windows Vista 
is still a bit of a mess. I typed "64-bit vista" into Google and nearly 
half of the results are pages warning people off of the 64-bit version 
due to driver issues and also arbitrary limitations imposed by 
Microsoft. Not to mention the fact that Vista was almost universally 
panned by critics on launch. Or the fact that its DRM imposes a bunch 
of artificial restrictions on the audio and video content that you 
already rightfully own. Eventually, there will come a point where users 
and PC vendors will no longer put up it and will look elsewhere. 

Linux and most open source software, on the other hand, have been 
capable of running on 64-bit architectures practically from the 
beginning. The only issues that I'm even aware of are things like some 
proprietary web browser plugins not working right.

The main area where Linux falls down is catering to Joe User. It's been 
a problem since the late 90's when everyone was talking about World 
Domination and it's still a problem although it's gotten much better 
and is now at least almost there. Commercial support (in terms of 
publicity, not actual tech support) has pretty much fallen by the 
wayside, though: Red Hat went completely commercial, IBM's big Linux 
push died out, and Novell's in bed with their own competition.

But despite these setbacks, there are some advancements being made. Dell 
has been shipping Linux as an option on their servers for awhile and it 
looks like we'll see Linux on some of their desktops in the near 
future. Michael Dell himself runs Ubuntu on one of his laptops at home. 
Anymore, you're hard-pressed to find a computer user who hasn't at 
least heard of Linux. Most I.T. professionals have tried a LiveCD once 
or twice or installed it on a test system. At the very least, it's in 
the public mind now.

Unless they shift into a different direction and/or abandon some of 
their old ways, I think Microsoft have seen their peak of dominance 
with XP. Without major changes to both the company _and_ the codebase, 
they can't sustain Vista in the long term and the only thing that's 
around to replace it is Linux. (If you're wondering why Apple isn't a 
contender, ESR and Landy's essay explains why.)

-- 
Charles Ulrich
Ideal Solution, LLC -- http://www.idealso.com