M$ FUD "of the year"

[Max Spain]

This post is being called the M$ FUD of the year, but it seems rather banal considering the things M$ has done in the past. Just thought I'd pass it along.

Original thread (http://www.overclock.net/windows/569458-microsoft-attack-linux-retail-level-probably.html#post7102419)
Mirror (http://quaoar.ww7.be/ms_fud_of_the_year/569458-microsoft-attack-linux-retail-level-probably.html)

[L33F3R]

nothing new. Certainly the EU has a ridiculous law that we can use to rob MS now, dont they :D

Honestly, how do we counter-attack :P

[deanjo]

Ya there is some FUD in there but he doesn't exactly refute claims with 100% truth himself.

No iPod support? Really? (http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/9266) And the Zune doesn't work on the Mac either although there has been some progress from the Linux community. And I've never had any problems pulling pictures from cameras.

When it comes to iPod support, really only older iPods are supported without jailbreaking the iPod. Not sure what OS X not being able to use the Zune has anything to do with Win 7 compatibility.


I've yet to see a printer that doesn't have a driver. You might have to download it from the products website though (gasp!).

He really hasn't looked all that hard. There are still quite a few consumer printers out there that have no linux support, some require purchasing of drivers (turboprint) and many printers out there do not have the same output in linux as they do with windows or OS X. On brother laser printers for example dithering is absolute shit on linux.

SANE doesn't exactly work with many scanners as well.

Games, ya they picked the wrong example, it does work fine in wine but otherwise the statement is true. It's a real hit or miss if wine is able to run a game or not.

As far as authorized support goes in linux for consumers that is usually limited to base installation and that's about it.

As far as video chat goes he doesn't exactly take on the question head on. Ya pidgin supports video chat on some of the major networks but not all.

[kraftman]

nothing new. Certainly the EU has a ridiculous law that we can use to rob MS now, dont they :D

Honestly, how do we counter-attack :P

Someone attacks when he feels threatened ;)

[L33F3R]

not L33F3R, L33F3R attacks when he's bored :p

[kraftman]

not L33F3R, L33F3R attacks when he's bored :p

No, no I thought about community ;)

[nanonyme]

Actually there's one bit in that whole paper I regard true and it's the one about updates. There can easily be so many that an average user will not read what is being updated. Thus they might not learn to be cautious with the updates. (Linux traditionally has a very back rollback ability with updates, would need to be some kind of filesystem level COW backups probably, and if you do an update that has a bug, the OS won't start; I'm not saying Windows does this well either but Linux could do it way way better than it does)

[L33F3R]

you are prolly right. But windows update as a whole is still a POS.

[nanonyme]

This is actually why I'm so interested about that RHEL's idea of liblvm. Having yum and apt use that would probably give means for very interesting solutions.

[frische]

Actually there's one bit in that whole paper I regard true and it's the one about updates. There can easily be so many that an average user will not read what is being updated. Thus they might not learn to be cautious with the updates. (Linux traditionally has a very back rollback ability with updates, would need to be some kind of filesystem level COW backups probably, and if you do an update that has a bug, the OS won't start; I'm not saying Windows does this well either but Linux could do it way way better than it does)

opensolaris does just that; i.e. create a new zfs snapshot for every update. once brtfs has stabilized, linux distros may do the same.

[nanonyme]

opensolaris does just that; i.e. create a new zfs snapshot for every update. once brtfs has stabilized, linux distros may do the same.I know and I'm slightly jealous of that feature. :p It's actually a sane thing to do. (Though implementing it in a way that works on top of LVM2 and can be ported later on to Btrfs would imo be more preferrable. Btrfs is still too far in the future)

[suokko]

I know and I'm slightly jealous of that feature. :p It's actually a sane thing to do. (Though implementing it in a way that works on top of LVM2 and can be ported later on to Btrfs would imo be more preferrable. Btrfs is still too far in the future)

Why not just keep old packages around and then reinstall them if something goes wrong? We just need some way to boot to fix mode if grub or kernel is failing in early boot.

[wiscados]

Why not just keep old packages around and then reinstall them if something goes wrong? We just need some way to boot to fix mode if grub or kernel is failing in early boot.
I think that's what RHEL does. I think downgrading is the only feature RPM has over DEB.

[nanonyme]

Why not just keep old packages around and then reinstall them if something goes wrong? We just need some way to boot to fix mode if grub or kernel is failing in early boot.Because if an install is actually botched (say, due to a power failure or so), you can get your libraries in an inconsistent state where high-level package manager is unusable and fixing the problem might require sorting out dozens of packages with low-level package management (where you have to sort out the dependencies yourself). To be easy and usable for HC geeks and casual users alike, Linux should be able to rollback in such situations.
(let alone the scary situations where power failure happens in the middle of something more important like eg glibc install)

[AdrenalineJunky]

I think that's what RHEL does. I think downgrading is the only feature RPM has over DEB.

though its not built in functionality for apt, you can still downgrade easily enough on debian, just download the package from debian-snapshot.org and install with dpkg -i

[suokko]

though its not built in functionality for apt, you can still downgrade easily enough on debian, just download the package from debian-snapshot.org and install with dpkg -i

apt-get install <package>=<version>

If repository still has the old version.

[Svartalf]

Because if an install is actually botched (say, due to a power failure or so), you can get your libraries in an inconsistent state where high-level package manager is unusable and fixing the problem might require sorting out dozens of packages with low-level package management (where you have to sort out the dependencies yourself). To be easy and usable for HC geeks and casual users alike, Linux should be able to rollback in such situations.

You're going to have cases where Windows won't do it any better- lots of them (I distinctly remember some rollback hell on some hotfixes in MS' past where it wasn't "simple" or "easy"...and they fubared your box so badly that it was easier to back up your data somehow and do a nuke-n-pave on the box.). And Linux is capable of the rollback- it's just that most distros don't worry about doing that because it IS painful unless you're using something like Nix or Conary and those two have their own issues and pains that don't make them much better than what we have right now.

[Max Spain]

Don't forget the Windows Update M$ pulled a few weeks ago that was bricking people's boxes (no boot). On Ubuntu for me updates are extremely quick and painless compared to updates for M$ OS's.

[deanjo]

Don't forget the Windows Update M$ pulled a few weeks ago that was bricking people's boxes (no boot). On Ubuntu for me updates are extremely quick and painless compared to updates for M$ OS's.

That pretty much happens from time to time on any OS where updates are applied.

[nanonyme]

You're going to have cases where Windows won't do it any betterNote that I didn't say they did. I just said we could do it better than we do. And a rollback isn't that bad if it's filesystem level and you can fallback to *everything* before the failed upgrade, perhaps by telling it in the bootloader. You'd have a series of upgrades be one transaction that would trigger a snapshot and then you could "cancel" even distro release upgrades if it doesn't work properly.

[thefirstm]

One of the things I like best about Linux package upgrades it that they are fast and usually painless. I remember back when I was still using Vista that installing Service Pack 1 took ~1.5 hours (on a system with a 2gHz Intel dualcore and a 7200RPM HD). I have never had any Linux update take longer than a few minutes.