Quote:
Originally Posted by SameOldStory
I know, I know. I should switch to Linux. Linux has no viruses.  |
Not so fast, said the diehard Linux user. There are rootkits and crapware out there for *nix-based (that means Apple too) operating systems; our anti-crapware apps just happen to be open-source
Seriously though, there
are viruses out there, they're just incredibly rare and require a monkey to be at the machine to give it executable permissions. Still, I have ClamAV and rkhunter installed because I'm just paranoid like that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SameOldStory
I have to work in the real world. The people I do work for (universities, military, corporate 1000, etc.) use Windows in their day to day business.
|
That's a common situation. There are ways around it; an entire industry full of them in fact. For instance, check out VirtualBox (
http://www.virtualbox.org/); there's an open-source edition and one for "Personal Use & Evaluation" (meaning "it has proprietary code in it"). I run my web server and Jabber server on separate Linux installs, along with my copy of Win7 for my postgrad stuff (which I take as seriously as you take your job, I surmise). All of it works like a charm and doesn't require a locomotive's horsepower to run well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SameOldStory
It's amazing how many people have an unthinking, irrational hated of Microsoft.
When MS was working out of a house and small, everybody loved them. They got real big & everybody hates them.
Kids born in the last 20 - 30 years don't even think of it, they just hate "Big Business". Microsoft is "Big Business" and therefore bad.
The same thing would have happened if their product was Apple or Linux OS/software.
In fact it looks like Apple is getting big enough to draw that kind of knee jerk reaction too.
|
I dunno about that; there are a few zealots in every crowd but the anti-MS ranting has been pretty dull since 7 came out. In fact there seems to be an ongoing backlash against Linux with kids mainly because the latest version of their favorite game might not play on it; Linux is for adults to do work and boring stuff. My wife's daughter is in her early 20s and has tried all 3; she jokes with me about how she doesn't like Mac or Linux but she admits that it's really all about how she can do what she wants to do in Windows better than the others. Co-workers of mine in the same age group you mention are pretty ambivalent about the whole thing as well, unless something breaks. When a Windows box is properly maintained, it's entirely capable of doing what many people need it to do. This from someone who swears by Linux and got his start on an Apple IIe somewhere around the Middle Ages.
Is Apple drawing the reaction? Apple is a company. Steve Jobs is a jerk. Works the same way with MS/Steve Ballmer, Oracle/Larry Ellison, or even Canonical/Mark Shuttleworth (who appears to be doing his level-best to distance Ubuntu from any Linux connection whatsoever). That's where I draw the line; you may see it differently. I never saw Bill Gates as evil or greedy or whatever. He did, however, have a fatal flaw: He tried to make an idiot-proof OS. The guy was (and is) smart. Ballmer, on the other hand, doesn't appear to have done anything right other than not driving MS into bankruptcy.