M$ pays moles to pretend to be Linux users
ziliath
are playing. And yet it's hard to detect without careful
observation.
Microsoft, or some other company, pays you to:
1. You pretend to be "Linux users", often providing no concrete proof
or anecdotes.
2. When a newbie or actual Linux user appears, you pummel them
with personal insults and other abuse, reject their useful
ideas as ill conceived or idiotic, and otherwise completely
trounce their goodwill.
3. They complain, and lo and behold, you label them "trolls"
and tell them to go back to Windows because they are so dumb
that they need it.
What a clever little trick. And I bet you aren't paid
more than minimum wage for it, poor bastards. At least you
love your employer, but that only proves what suckers you are.
Ralph
7
> It's a very simple game that most (if not all) of you
So did clippy incite you to write this then?
kier
> It's a very simple game that most (if not all) of you
> are playing. And yet it's hard to detect without careful
> observation.
Who is this 'you'? It ain't me, that's for sure.
>
> Microsoft, or some other company, pays you to:
>
> 1. You pretend to be "Linux users", often providing no concrete proof
> or anecdotes.
>
> 2. When a newbie or actual Linux user appears, you pummel them
> with personal insults and other abuse, reject their useful
> ideas as ill conceived or idiotic, and otherwise completely
> trounce their goodwill.
When I, as a newbie, appeared here, I was received politely. But then, I
had the sense to lurk for a while and get some feel for who was and was
not genuine. Nor did I post unrelated nonsense, or troll, or behave
stupidly, or pretend I knew more than I do.
> 3. They complain, and lo and behold, you label them "trolls" and tell
> them to go back to Windows because they are so dumb that they need it.
There's a difference between a user who isn't suited to or ready for Linux
distros, and one who is a troll. Personally, I came here because I'm not
that technically-minded, and much of the technical discussions on other
groups is too advanced for me. Here, at least I can participate, and talk
to other linux users.
> What a clever little trick. And I bet you aren't paid more than
minimum
> wage for it, poor bastards. At least you love your employer, but that
> only proves what suckers you are.
Frankly, you're talking utter bollocks.
--
Kier
GreyCloud
7 wrote:
I think that jumpy dog finally found the spot... his leg.
--
---------------------------------
The Golden Years Sux.
Baruch
No company is going to pay people to troll a Linux NG. The "bang per buck"
ratio is too small.
Think: how many people do you think this NG really reaches - a thousand?
Ten thousand? That would be generous. Let's even say 100 thousand. OK,
of those, how many use Windows now, and are only thinking about changing
over to Linux (as opposed to folks already using Linux)? Not even half,
probably. Of those, how many are going to be deterred by some jerk abusing
them? Not many. They may stop using the NG, but they probably won't let
some knucklehead keep them from trying Linux, if they want to give it a
try.
Microsoft wouldn't bother with a newsgroup; neither would any company that
cared for profits. You might get some corporation headed by a maniac who
was funding a "holy war" of some sort, but it's unlikely.
No, to my way of thinking, some people here abuse newbies and others because
they're jerks, not because they're getting paid by anyone. Linux users are
like anyone else - most of us are OK, but there are the occasional jerks.
As someone remarked, the trouble with the world is not all the clowns are in
the circus...
Gunthar
> Think: how many people do you think this NG really reaches - a thousand?
> Ten thousand? That would be generous. Let's even say 100 thousand. OK,
> of those, how many use Windows now, and are only thinking about changing
> over to Linux (as opposed to folks already using Linux)? Not even half,
> probably. Of those, how many are going to be deterred by some jerk abusing
> them? Not many. They may stop using the NG, but they probably won't let
> some knucklehead keep them from trying Linux, if they want to give it a
> try.
>
Take a look sometime at the top written to and read newsgroups in Usenet.
Once you exclude binaries and porno groups, COLA is one of the top
newsgroups in USENET.
And that doesn't include all the hits that articles might get from
Google Groups.
Baruch
Actually, it's not that important to me. However popular this NG may be
relatively speaking, it doesn't have that large an audience compared to
more mainstream media such as television, radio, and ordinary Websites.
Microsoft - if it even bothers to try to scare people away from Linux -
isn't likely to waste money here, when it could reach far more people far
more easily with (for example) news reports about some horrible disaster
caused by Linux.
People who come to COLA are already somewhat familiar with how computers
work. They are far less amenable to brain-washing than those whose
experience is along the lines of AOL or MSN. If someone's already thinking
about Linux, then it's much less likely that a little FUD will scare them
away.
Certainly I wouldn't say Microsoft is *morally* above trying something like
planting moles in NG's. It's just that I don't think they'd consider it
economically feasible. How many people would they keep from trying Linux,
ad of those, how many would then stop buying Microsoft products? How much
profit would they save, versus how much money they'd spend to save it?
When I see conspiracy theories - such as Microsoft moles - I am skeptical.
Sure, it could happen, but - let's see some evidence. I can't imagine how
you'd go about proving there are moles, but - well, without some evidence,
I don't buy it.
As for the supposed "evidence" of certain Linux experts abusing newcomers,
this is hardly limited to Microsoft. I've seen flame wars going on in
sewing NG's and of course in alt.math. What's to argue in math?
Apparently, plenty. Your mama divides by zero...
Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz
08/25/2004
at 01:05 PM, zil...@myway.com (ziliath) said:
>2. When a newbie or actual Linux user appears, you pummel them with
>personal insults and other abuse, reject their useful ideas as ill
>conceived or idiotic,
Quite often their ideas are not useful and are ill conceived and
idiotic. That is especially the case when they want to break something
in Linux in order to make it look more like windoze.
>3. They complain, and lo and behold, you label them "trolls"
The Devil is in the details. Not all complaints are the same. I've
generally been able to "complain" without being labelled a troll,
because I describe real issues, don't cross post to 'doze news groups,
don't say that the problem I have means that Linux isn't as good as
that POS 'doze and generally describe the problem as a glitch in an
otherwise good system.
--
Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz, SysProg and JOAT <http://patriot.net/~shmuel>
Unsolicited bulk E-mail subject to legal action. I reserve the
right to publicly post or ridicule any abusive E-mail. Reply to
domain Patriot dot net user shmuel+news to contact me. Do not
reply to spam...@library.lspace.org
Larry M. Coleman
>
> Microsoft wouldn't bother with a newsgroup; neither would any company that
> cared for profits. You might get some corporation headed by a maniac who
> was funding a "holy war" of some sort, but it's unlikely.
>
One already exists; it's called SCO.
--Larry M. Coleman
Sinister Midget
> Certainly I wouldn't say Microsoft is *morally* above trying something like
> planting moles in NG's. It's just that I don't think they'd consider it
> economically feasible. How many people would they keep from trying Linux,
> ad of those, how many would then stop buying Microsoft products? How much
> profit would they save, versus how much money they'd spend to save it?
MICROS~1 /loses/ money on the Xbox. In fact, they /lose/ money on
everything but Windoze and (filthy)Office. They still consider such
losses as money well spent.
The (obscene) profit margin for Windwoes alone was in the mid-eighties
(86% I think). Orifice is also outrageous. I think that they could find
some maneuvering space in that amount of gouging to try to protect that
amount of gouging.
That doesn't mean you're wrong. But it means you could very easily be
wrong using the reasons you've given.
Besides, they've done it before.* They still spend money on obvious
and blatant lies that have to cost a lot more than the real return.**
* Enter Ewik, telling everybody how the evidence doesn't mean anything
because Bill's fingerprints were wiped clean from the murder weapon.
** Take a look at their "truth" web site, follow the links to their
"independent studies", marvel that anyone might actually think there is
any independence in the results, realize that some people can't think,
or they're looking for whatever excuses they can find to avoid making
decisions.
--
It would appear that any instability in a Windows 2000 system is NOT
due to any inherent problem that exists in Windows itself.
-- T.G.Reaper
-- A Wintendo User
spi...@freenet.co.uk
> It's a very simple game that most (if not all) of you
> are playing. And yet it's hard to detect without careful
> observation.
> Microsoft, or some other company, pays you to:
> 1. You pretend to be "Linux users", often providing no concrete proof
> or anecdotes.
Well, that rules me out. Phew eh? I've got a posting history to prove my
linuxness thankyouverymuch.
You know what though....
I'm suffering from a terrible feeling of deja vu.
So bad in fact, I'm almost expecting a door-to-door psychiatrist milk float
any second now.
spi...@freenet.co.uk
> begin On Wed, 25 Aug 2004 13:09:49 -0700, Ralph wrote:
>> So, how much is MS paying you?
> Same as they're paying DooFu$ probably!
Too much.
kev
> No company is going to pay people to troll a Linux NG. The "bang per
> buck" ratio is too small.
um - you're making the mistake that MS would always do things which are
sensible, profitable, sane, etc
remember flight simulator - bill personally liked playing flight sims -
therefore he bought the company - nothing financial about the decision,
kev
Linønut
>> No company is going to pay people to troll a Linux NG. The "bang per
>> buck" ratio is too small.
>
> um - you're making the mistake that MS would always do things which are
> sensible, profitable, sane, etc
>
> remember flight simulator - bill personally liked playing flight sims -
> therefore he bought the company - nothing financial about the decision,
Hey, that's just like Victor Kiam! He liked the Remington microscreen (shaver)
so much, he bought the company!
Say, maybe Bill's into flying for real. Let's send him out over the Puget
Sound in some heavy fog.
The Ghost In The Machine
<linøn...@bone.com>
wrote
on Thu, 26 Aug 2004 09:43:42 -0500
<ZuqdnWLI_4u...@comcast.com>:
Didn't a Kennedy try that one already? :-)
--
#191, ewi...@earthlink.net
It's still legal to go .sigless.
iAn
>
> What a clever little trick. And I bet you aren't paid
> more than minimum wage for it, poor bastards. At least you
> love your employer, but that only proves what suckers you are.
A few years ago, there was an actual article that described Microsoft's
strategy to monitor NG's to track Linux information.
--
A fatal exception 0E has occurred at 0028:C000BD1D in VXD VMM(01) +
0000AD1D. The current application will be terminated.
Rex Ballard
news:<UubXc.7473$FV3....@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>...
> ziliath wrote:
> No company is going to pay people to troll a Linux NG. The "bang per buck"
> ratio is too small.
Actually, Microsoft has paid a small number of people, around 10-12,
to attempt to alter
public opinion via this newsgroup and others like it. They first
announced that they were
doing it in 1998, and have continued the practice to this date.
> Think: how many people do you think this NG really reaches - a thousand?
> Ten thousand? That would be generous.
Actually, this would be about right. There are numerous lurkers who
monitor various
newsgroups, precisely because it is an uncensored source of public
opinion. These lurkers
include reporters for national media, government officials and their
support staff,
corporate officers and their support staff, and numerous other
strategic planners.
This has been going on even since the earliest days of usenet, back
when it was still based
on UUCP. ARPA actually considered usenet to be a valuable source of
intelligence, which is
why they offered to carry usenet traffic over arpa-net. It was this
merger that became
known as "The Internet" in 1984.
The main advantage of observing a usenet newsgroup is that you can see
not only how a
particular opinion, position, policy, product, or service will be or
is being perceived in
by a public that seems to have no qualms with either agreeing quite
vocally, or disagreeing
quite vocally (via usenet follow-ups). More importantly, you can see
HOW people respond,
what resonates the most with supporters, what counter arguments are
being put forward by the
opposition. Long before going to the mass media and possibly
alienating millions of voters,
customers, readers, or viewers, you can observe the best ways of
dealing with these
positions.
Suppose a Republican wants to get elected in a district which has
enough white collar upper
middle-class conservatives to get him elected if they were fully
mobilized and the
opposition wasn't. He could advocate segregation by announcing that
he wants to bring back
neighborhood schools (meaning that school districts with high property
taxes and low crime
have lots of money for education, while districts with high
unemployment, high crime, and
low income have very little money for education). The problem is that
this will trigger a
very sudden mobilization of the minorities, poor, and even lower
middle-class, who will make
sure that they are registered (even if they don't usually vote), and
would make sure they
show up to vote - against you. This would not only harm the
Republican candidate, it would
adversely affect all Republicans being elected that day, since the
opposition would vote
against them as well.
Suppose instead, that this same candidate says, we need to hold
districts accountable, and
offer vouchers in districts which cannot meet educational standards.
This actually means
that upper middle-class families can pull their kids out of public
schools and have their
tax money redirected to the private church-schools selected by the
parents. As this siphons
more money out of the public school system, the achievement drops
further, driving more of
the middle-class to the private schools, leaving the poor districts
with no funds.
Eventually, the solution is to "privatize" the public schools, turning
them into
recreational complexes where there are 50 students per class, and the
focus shifts to
keeping the kids entertained (watching history channel) rather than
challenging them through
direct interaction.
However, the usenet newsgroups have shown that the second approach is
less likely to
mobilize the opposition. They hear "he wants to improve education".
The middle-class
figures that the vouchers will cover the entire tuition and so they
can send their kids to
private schools. The net result is that the same net goal
(segregation of rich and poor) is
now an acceptable public issue.
> Let's even say 100 thousand. OK,
> of those, how many use Windows now, and are only thinking about changing
> over to Linux (as opposed to folks already using Linux)?
Let's look at the impact that the usenet newsgroups, especially COLA
has had on the
industry, and on Microsoft.
When Microsoft's tactics for preventing the spread of Linux in 1995
were discussed in the
usenet newsgroups, there were a number of lurkers. One notable
character, the mysterious
"Roger@", began to probe more deeply, before long, the discussions
included specifics,
including companies, names, dates, and even information about specific
contracts. Within a
matter of months, the Contempt of court filing were initiated, then
the Antitrust
litigation. Both of these were a direct response to issues raised in
this newsgroup.
Infoworld began to observe the excitement of Linux on COLA and after
investigation decided
that Red Hat 4.0 tied with NT 4.0 for product of the year.
Most of IBM's computers were very Linux friendly. As a result, IBM
began getting more
feedback. When they began taking browser metrics using methods
proposed in this newsgroup,
they found that the market was actually quite substantial. When they
began taking metrics
of servers, they similarly found that Linux was a very lucrative
market. The market was big
enough that IBM decided that Linux was worth a $1 billion investment
in research,
development, marketing, promotion, and support.
Microsoft is one of those who monitors these discussions most closely.
Many of Microsoft's
"Innovations" were initiated in response to discussions on COLA.
TCP/IP - first discussed on comp.os.unix and comp.dcom.* groups, Linux
threatened
Microsoft's market by making it possible to use a machine that
normally ran Windows 3.1 and
load it with Linux to access the internet. By early 1993, Linux
support included X11R6 and
ran most of the Open Source software available for Sun Solaris, HP
HP_UX, and IBM AIX
machines. In response to this threat, Microsoft released Windows 3.11
and included the
WinSock TCP/IP stack. Much of this was to prevent the proliferation
of Trumpet Winsock,
which was more unix-like.
Web Browsers - also discussed on comp.os.unix, Linux had support for
both the web browser
and the web server. In fact, Linux had support for Lynx and Viola,
both of which preceeded
Mosaic by almost 2 years. Microsoft realized that if they did not
offer a browser, and very
quickly, that Linux could quickly capture much of the market that was
still oriented mostly
toward "terminals" that connected to mainframes and UNIX servers.
True Multitasking - Microsoft initially saw the need for true
preemptive multitasking when
Sun's ILC and SLC "lunchbox" machines were allowing power-users to
watch stock tickers in
real-time while they composed e-mail and reviewed financial reports.
These Sun machines
still cost as much as 4 times more than the typical Windows 3.0 PC,
and nearly twice as much
as the new Windows 3.1 machines. By February of 1992, it was obvious
that Linux would be
able to offer similar capabilities on standard Windows hardware. By
the end of 1992, Linux
supported X11, and was ready to ship. Microsoft tried to convince
OEMs, Corporate IT
Managers, and the press, that Windows NT was going to ship any day.
By the time Windows NT
finally did ship, Linux was already available on a single CD-ROM along
with nearly all of
the Open Source software previously available for UNIX. Many of those
companies who had
software available for UNIX Workstations, such as the Applix Office
Suite, and the
FrameMaker multimedia editor, were already porting to Linux.
Plug-and-play - Shortly after the release of Windows NT 3.x, Linux
came out with
"plug-and-play" capabilities. This created a real problem for
Microsoft because it was
suddenly easier to install Linux than it was to install Windows 3.11
or Windows NT 3.x.
Microsoft not only had to have plug-and-play, but they needed to make
sure that their
implementation made it harder to install Linux than to install
Windows. They held up
Windows 95 for nearly a year, waiting until all of the OEMs and
hardware vendors signed
agreements promising not to provide information useful to Linux
developers. Since Microsoft
controlled the translations from the Vendor ID and Device ID code to
the driver and/or
chipset, Linux was hindered. This was probably illegal, but Red Hat
didn't have the big
lawyers required to attack Microsoft or the OEMs head-on. The break
came when Adaptec, who
had been promised that all Windows 95 machines would run SCSI only,
found out that Microsoft
had merely included the IDE drivers as one of the "SCSI" adapters.
When Microsoft said, yes
we violated our agreement- what are you going to do about it? -
Adaptec gave the entire PCI
device translation table to Red Hat, giving them the ability to
configure Plug-and-play
devices using Microsoft's codes.
Reliability - When Windows NT 4.0 first came out, a COLA poster coined
the term "Blue Screen
of Death", which quickly caught on everywhere. People weren't talking
about the new
features of Windows NT 4.0, they were talking about BSOD. Microsoft
very quickly took
corrective action, and issued SP1. Ironically, even as the COLA
discussion was focused on
BSOD, Microsoft was telling CIOs and IT Managers that they could use
NT 4.0 to replace UNIX
systems and that their costs would be lower than UNIX. To maintain
credibility, Microsoft
continued issuing Service Packs, and also tried to show Windows NT 5.0
very early.
Ironically, just as Bill Gates was saying "and it's more reliable than
UNIX" the NT 5.0
machine went into "Blue Screen of Death". Microsoft completely
overhauled the system,
replacing much of their own code with BSD UNIX code, and by the time
they released Windows
2000, had fixed most of the bugs. By Service Pack 2, Windows 2000 was
remarkably stable.
In fact, it offered performance and reliability comporable to SunOS
4.0 or Slackware 2.0.
Security - While Windows NT 4.0 did offer better security, nearly all
users had to run in
the "Administrator" mode. Attempts to "lock down" other types of
users failed miserably.
Most users were only given one login identity, and that was as an
administrator. Even if
you did switch to another user ID, you had to completely log off.
Windows XP provided the
ability to quickly switch between the Administrator ID, and the
standard user ID. While
this was still nowhere near as good as setuid scripts, or sudo or even
su, it was better
than having a virus enter your administrator account and wipe out the
entire computer.
Performance - Microsoft proudly boasted that Windows was pure "object
oriented", while Linux
and UNIX were based on older, therefore inferior technology.
Unfortunately, in real-world
benchmarks, Linux consistently outperformed Windows NT. Part of the
problem was that each
time a context switch or function caused the system to page new memory
into the cache, the
useful code was pulling in as much as 80% "dead code" like exception
handlers, help
functions, and initialization routines, along with the critical path
code. A page of 512
bytes might only include 40 bytes of needed code. After a detailed
study of the Linux
kernel and libraries, Microsoft decoupled each of the core functions,
and packed them
together. Ironically, this meant that Microsoft was essentially
implementing a functionally
oriented library, which was exactly what they were deriding as "20
year old technology".
Much of this was a direct result of discussions on the usenet
newsgroups. Even the actual
reccomendations for changes came from this newsgroup. The members of
the newsgroup pointed
out that they had learned this same hard lesson with X11 about 10
years earlier.
NT Server - Microsoft originally didn't think that they needed to have
NT as a server. They
figured that Windows was a workstation. But Linux, which had the
capabilities of both a
workstation and a server, was able to exploit this using peer-to-peer
models as well as
being able to have it's own internal web server process forms from
it's own internal
browser. This meant that users could implement powerful programs
which were platform
independent using standard CGI or Apache MOD_ plugins. This prompted
Microsoft to implement
server functions for the NT system as well. Ironically, when NT 3.x
sales fell far short of
expectations, Microsoft was able to quickly announce that they were
marketing NT as a
server. Microsoft didn't seem to care that they had promised Novell
that they would not do
a server if Novell agreed not to do a Workstation version of UNIXWare.
Again, most of this
was driven by discussions on Comp.Os.UNIX and COLA.
Instant Messenger - Linux offered both IRC and LDAP. The modular
design of Linux allowed
users to look up users on LDAP, see if they were "active" and initiate
chats with them.
In addition, users who wanted to chat with a specific group could just
connect to an IRC
"room" and lurk. If someone wanted to "whisper" to them, they could
switch to a different
private room. Microsoft offered a very nice IRC client with Windows
95 "Plus Pack", which
let users choose comic book identities. Still, when groups got really
busy, the raw IRC let
you type faster, and see what was happening in the discussion as you
typed.
CORBA/DCOM/COM+ - CORBA was a protocol which allowed GUI interfaces on
Windows or Java to
interact with complex server programs in very flexible ways. Because
the objects were
communicating with each other at the attribute and method level,
complex interactions could
be safely and securely integrated across any combination of platforms.
Hot discussions of
this technology, along with Java Applets, were threatening to make it
possible to have word
processors, diagrams, charts, and spreadsheets that would update
themselves in real-time
which could run on both Windows and Linux clients, and could run on
Windows or UNIX servers,
as well as legacy servers. Microsoft's initial response was to
introduce DCOM, which
provided an IDL and also featured nearly all of the Microsoft COM
objects prepackaged in a
DLL/EXE so that programmers could use their Microsoft-only APIs across
networks. There was
such a severe penalty for using DCOM to have an NT client call it's
own internal server that
applications had to NOT use DCOM internally.
ActiveX - The COLA and comp.lang.java newsgroups kept hammering at the
big weakness of "Fat
Client" technology. The big problem was that if you have everyone
install a fat client on
their machine, but you needed to change the client to support a new
feature offered by the
server, or even the addition of one field, you had to deploy a new
client, and support the
old client, often for several years. Java had solved this problem
with Applets, which meant
that you could ship over a class or to, have that invoke classes on
the workstation, and
then interact with the server. Sun was aware that this could be a
security problem, so they
created a "sandbox" which meant that the applet could only access
resources on the remote
server. This prevented the applet from opening, reading, or writing
files on the
workstation side. Microsoft decided to implement it's DCOM by pushing
what amounted to a
stripped down subset of the DCOM client, which could then use the DLLs
of the client to
implment ANY function that had been installed on the workstation.
They claimed to address
the security problem by using certificate authentication to validate
the server and the
author. In theory, anyone who put up a hostile ActiveX control could
be caught and
prosecuted. Ironically, it was COLA who tried to warn the world of
the risks of ActiveX.
There were sites which illustrated examples of how malicious code
could be installed,
published, and destributed while still being untraceable. Eventually,
Microsoft went to
court to have these sites shut down, citing their dialogues in COLA as
examples of promoting
the proliferation of malicious code.
VBScript - Linux had a solution which was much more elegant. They
simply published scripts,
which were human readable, and compiled them almost at run-time. PERL
and PYTHON were
examples of this. These languages featured GUI extensions which made
it possible to display
content. Linux had another advantage. The client-side functions
could be controlled using
setuid and access permissions. If you wanted a user to be able to
read a shared file, the
PERL script could call a binary or shell script which would check to
make sure you had
permission to execute the program, then run the program as a different
user, then return the
results back to the calling program as a string. Even if the "server
program" was accessing
a file on the local machine, the application users couldn't read the
file. This meant that a
malicious hacker couldn't upload your entire customer database file.
Linux also featured
Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) which meant that every access
could be authenticated
against an internal file, an encrypted internal file, an external
encrypted file, a Kerberos
Server, an LDAP server, or a number of other "authentication
services". Microsoft
understood the advantages of human readable script, so they
implemented VBScript. The only
problem was that they still wanted to keep people tied to the
Microsoft APIs, so they had
VBScript call ActiveX controls. Microsoft also offered a number of
additional security
models, but since they wanted to monitor piracy and customer activity
for "support purposes"
(knowing how to kill competitors), they kept a number of "back doors"
open, most of which
were easily exploited by hackers using the same technology Microsoft
had been warned about
when they first introduced ActiveX.
Microsoft Defensive Measures inspired by COLA:
Single Partition - In early 1994, Red Hat offered Linux to OEMs for
$1/machine, and offered
to let them install it in a small partition on the hard drive. The
OEM would create a large
partition (70-80%) for Windows, and a small partition (20-30%) for
Windows. If the user
didn't like Linux, they could delete the Linux partition and use that
partition as a backup
for Windows. This was first discussed on COLA. Microsoft moved to
prevent this
partitioning by demanding that all PCs not only be partitioned as a
single partition (making
system level back-up nearly impossible) but also had the BIOS restrict
the SIZE of an IDE
drive to prevent the replacement with a drive which could hold both
the Windows and Linux
partitions. In addition, the Windows 95 installation procedure
removed all partitions
(including the windows partition) and rewrote the master boot record,
wiping out boot
managers offered by Linux and OS/2.
Boot Control - Slackware and Red Hat both offered the capability to
put the Linux files on
the Windows file system, then use a boot manager to boot Linux instead
of Windows. Linux
could read Windows files on FAT (and later FAT32) partitions, in
addition, Linux could read
files inside it's secure ext2 image file. When the drive was
defragmented, the effect was
the same as a partition. These were proposals initiated on usenet
newsgroups, then
implemented with the aid of usenet newsgroups, including COLA.
Microsoft countered by
demanding that all OEMs install the image exactly as initially
installed by Microsoft's
installer. They were not allowed to tamper with the boot sequence in
any way, this
prevented the installation of not only any boot managers, but also any
third party
applicatinos such as Netscape. Microsoft was charged with violation
of their 1993
settlement with the DOJ, but eventually had the judgement against them
nullified by the
appeals court in 1998. This initiated the DOJ lawsuit and Boot
control became a critical
element of the DOJ settlement. Microsoft was not allowed to prevent
OEMs from installing
boot manager that allowed users to boot into Linux images files.
NetMeeting and Remote Support - Linux had the ability to access it's
GUI interface via a
remote connection port. X11 had this feature for years, and Microsoft
was able to avoid the
issue for many years. There were several "screen scrapers" such as
Carbon Copy and
PCAnywhere, both of which required very high bandwidth network
connections and required that
each user take exclusive control of the only available graphical user
interface. This was
very hard to manage, and often a user would go to lunch while
co-workers impatiently waited
their turn for access to the server. This feature was originally
offered as a way for
Windows 3.x and 9x users to access applications (such as Java and
DCOM) which would only run
on NT. Linux users began using VNC to access their Windows NT machine
from their Linux
console. The great thing is that they not only could access the
system without requiring an
extra keyboard and monitor, but since Linux had multiple desktops,
they could use Linux to
switch between different Windows servers. The VNC Server also
provided the ability to allow
multiple users to access the same machine. They were still sharing
the same desktop, but
you could watch what your coworker was doing, and they could turn
control over to you. If
you also had chat or instant messageing between the two of you, you
could view presentations
together. Microsoft began to see that this too was a big threat. If
Linux became the
primary desktop, users would eventually transition from the Microsoft
applications (Office,
IE, ...) to Linux applications (StarOffice, Netscape, ...). Microsoft
introduced
NetMeeting. This gave users the ability to not only share their
desktop, but also to have a
little chat window in which they could exchange comments. Microsoft
even added a media
viewer (between Linux users, they would just use standard IRC or
X.329?, Windows and Linux
users could use AIM or YIM with Linux users using NAIM)
Cliff-Tiered Pricing - COLA users have long advocated that OEMs should
dedicate some of
their line to Linux. In other words, OEMs should be able to offer
Linux users systems which
do not have Windows priced into them. The OEMS should be able to get
the profit advantage
of selling a system that either comes with no operating system, a free
operating system like
FreeDOS, or a higher priced system that comes preconfigured with
Linux. Microsoft has
relied on a pricing structure which essentially makes the OEM pay a
premium price unless he
purchases more licenses than he can possibly sell with machines. This
is referred to as a
"discount", but given that Microsoft's margins are over 80%
(Microsoft's costs are $2 out of
every $10 paid), it's clear that anything more than the "off the
cliff" lower price/unit is
simply a penalty to punish OEMs who don't buy at least enough licenses
to cover every single
machine they sell. When you sell 100,000 machines, and Microsoft will
sell you 100,000
licenses for $8 million, but they will sell you 120,000 licenses for
$7 million, that higher
price/unit is a penalty.
Hardware Lock-out - Both WinTrols and COLA users alike have to admit
that one of the big
problems Linux has always had, is that you can't get the drivers
needed to run the latest
hardware on Linux. You can run Linux on an AMD-64 but you might not
be able to use the
graphics card, or the wireless card, or the network controller, or the
modem. It's not that
the drivers aren't available, in many cases, the devices are initially
tested with Linux.
Microsoft simply contracts with the hardware vendor, often the chip
vendor, and tells them
that if they don't want to be excluded from the hardware specification
on the hardware
required and supported by the next version of Windows, they will have
to agree not to
publish a driver for Linux. In addition, they have to promise not to
provide information
which would make it possible for anyone else to create a driver for
Linux. Lately Microsoft
has even asked them to threaten legal action against anyone who
attempts to publish a driver
for Linux. This is usually for some period beyond the initial release
of the hardware, to
make sure that OEMs are unable to install Linux on their machines
during the initial product
announcement.
Standard Deviation - COLA discussions frequently include the
advantages of certain standards
such as TCP/IP, HTTP, IRC, LDAP, or XML. Microsoft routinely attempts
"embrace and extend"
these standards. Keep in mind that these standards are the product of
many organizations
working together to create a common baseline which can be used between
any of those who
adhere to the standard. In many cases, $billions worth of
intellectual property (by
Microsoft's valuation anyway) are contributed by the various member
organizations. In fact,
nearly all of these standards are initially implemented as Open Source
projects, and usually
on Linux. Microsoft effectively "steals" this intellectual property
by first announcing
that they will be implementing it in their next release (reducing the
demand for the Open
Source or Linux version). Tnen, when they actually deliver the new
release or service pack,
there is some sort of deviation. This deviation is something
controlled by Microsoft,
revealed only under strict nondisclosure agreements, and only in a
manner which guarantees
that it cannot be implemented in the Open Source technology in time to
prevent Microsoft
from locking the Open Source/Linux version out of the marketplace.
The net result is that a
company like IBM or SUN will contribute an Open Source implementation
to support the
adoption of their standard, then Microsoft will implement a deviation
of the standard which
forces IBM and SUN to pay royalties on it's own technologies.
> Not even half,
> probably. Of those, how many are going to be deterred by some jerk abusing
> them?
The key here is that these abuse rants tend to decrease the signal to
noise ratio.
Most knowledgable COLA lurkers know who are high quality posters with
a very good signal to
noise ratio (2000 lines of original content, or more, at least 80%
original content - not
quotes) and who has a particularly low signal to noise ratio ( less
than 100 lines of
original content, more than 80% quoted material).
I have posted these numbers a few times, and I usually show up in the
top 10.
Erik Funkenbush is a very high S/N WinTroll. He's very good at
pointing out the errors in a
Pengunista posting. He usually only responds to very high quality
postings, and focuses on
a very small section of errors. A knowledgeble lurker will look for
Eric's posts, and read
the parent articles in the thread.
Drestin Black was an excellent WinTroll, he had very high signal/noise
and regularly
produced good documentation, numerous links (usually back to Microsoft
URLs), and would
frequently start new threads rather than do follow-ups (giving him
control of the subject
line for the whole thread).
Flatfish is/was a noisy WinTroll - he usually plopped a URL, then
added a very short
paragraph to incite response (often completly out of context with the
root of his link). He
would aften add 1-line zingers every few paragraphs, leaving the
entire quoted article in
his reply. The interesting thing however, was that Flatty often
triggered some really
thoughtful follow-ups to his URL and comment posts.
> Not many. They may stop using the NG, but they probably won't let
> some knucklehead keep them from trying Linux, if they want to give it a
> try.
Again, this is mostly a way of intimidating those influencial lurkers.
If someone asks a
reasonable question, and gets blasted with 40 ad-homoniem attacks, and
5 considerate
responses, there is a better chance that he will miss the responses.
This is especially a
problem if they are using google groups or some other "page at a time"
display tool. At
least with google, you can view an entire thread and fish out the good
stuff.
> Microsoft wouldn't bother with a newsgroup; neither would any company that
> cared for profits. You might get some corporation headed by a maniac who
> was funding a "holy war" of some sort, but it's unlikely.
As I said before, Microsoft has publicly announced that they have
hired what we call
WinTrolls since as early as 1998. Microsoft has been acutely aware of
Linux since 1993 and
probably first got nervous when Linus posted his second release of the
kernel in 1992.
Microsoft has revised the language of OEM contracts, EULA, and
Corporate licenses, all
designed to prevent the proliferation of Linux.
Ironically, Microsoft depends on the ignorance of those who DON'T read
COLA.
If IBM, DELL, HP, or COMPAQ had read COLA, they could have started
marketing "dual boot"
Linux/Windows systems as early as mid 1993. By 1994 they would have
reduced the price they
paid for Microsoft licenses by as much as 60%. By 1995, they would
have been able to sell
machines at nearly double the margins they got for Windows 95. By
1997, IBM and HP would
have been offering Linux servers to users who wanted a PC based
server. These users could
have scaled to AIX or HP_UX. Ironically, SUN did use this approach.
When customers
couldn't get the funding for pilot projects, they could implement on
Linux. Sun made it as
easy as they could for users to migrate Linux applications to SUN
equipment. As a result,
SUN increased it's share of the midrange market until 1998 - when IBM
started easing the
migration from Linux to AIX. HP has still been a bit conflicted -
they actually have a very
good version of Linux for their HP-9000 series machines, and yet they
are reluctant to
aggressively promote Linux on x86 machines to facilitate migration to
HP_UX or Linux on
HP/9000.
Just yesterday, I posted a complete specification for digital rights
management, and the
following day, Time Warner signed a deal with Microsoft which means
that Microsoft may get
several $billion from Time/Warner for every movie, song, or picture
pulled. The use of the
GPL - with one minor alteration (ANY alteration must be sent back to
the originator and
approved by the originator) means that any attempt to alter the code
to "remember" keys you
are supposed to forget, results in a copyright violation.
Judge Kollar-Kotelly should be reading COLA on a daily basis -
numerous violations of the
settlement have been identified in this group. At minimum, it should
be mandatory that the
compliance officer investigate these actions, confirm them, and order
Microsoft to delete
language that effectively excludes Linux, punishes OEMs for not
excluding Linux (by
rewarding OEMs who use technology which excludes linux as a function
of contracts with the
IHVs.
> No, to my way of thinking, some people here abuse newbies and others because
> they're jerks, not because they're getting paid by anyone.
This is probably true. On the other hand, if you really wanted to try
and drive people away
from a group which consistently points out the strengths of your
adversary, and consistently
points out your weaknesses, having two or three people post dozens of
really insulting
follow-ups under dozens of different identitities might create the
first impression that
their are 120 jerks and only 2-3 considerate and thoughtful people.
> Linux users are like anyone else - most of us are OK,
> but there are the occasional jerks.
I agree. I've actually had to chastize my on son for posting an
insulting follow-up to a
legitimate question. He followed the insults with some relevant
content, but could have
lost the reader in the first few seconds.
> As someone remarked, the trouble with the world is not all the clowns are in
> the circus...
And not all clowns are really clowns.
Rex Ballard
Rex Ballard
> ziliath wrote:
My earlier version got mangled, This is a repost, hopefully prettier.
> No company is going to pay people to troll a Linux NG. The "bang per buck"
> ratio is too small.
Actually, Microsoft has paid a small number of people, around 10-12,
to attempt to alter public opinion via this newsgroup and others like it.
They first announced that they were doing it in 1998, and have continued
the practice to this date.
> Think: how many people do you think this NG really reaches - a thousand?
> Ten thousand? That would be generous.
Actually, this would be about right. There are numerous lurkers who
> Let's even say 100 thousand. OK,
> of those, how many use Windows now, and are only thinking about changing
> over to Linux (as opposed to folks already using Linux)?
Let's look at the impact that the usenet newsgroups, especially COLA
> Not even half,
> probably. Of those, how many are going to be deterred by some jerk abusing
> them?
The key here is that these abuse rants tend to decrease the signal to noise ratio.
Most knowledgable COLA lurkers know who are high quality posters with a
very good signal to noise ratio (2000 lines of original content, or more,
at least 80% original content - not quotes) and who has a particularly
low signal to noise ratio ( less than 100 lines of original content,
more than 80% quoted material).
I have posted these numbers a few times, and I usually show up in the top 10.
Erik Funkenbush is a very high S/N WinTroll. He's very good at pointing
out the errors in a Pengunista posting. He usually only responds to very
high quality postings, and focuses on a very small section of errors.
A knowledgeble lurker will look for Eric's posts, and read the parent
articles in the thread.
Drestin Black was an excellent WinTroll, he had very high signal/noise
and regularly produced good documentation, numerous links (usually back
to Microsoft URLs), and would frequently start new threads rather than do
follow-ups (giving him control of the subject line for the whole thread).
Flatfish is/was a noisy WinTroll - he usually plopped a URL, then
added a very short paragraph to incite response (often completly out of
context with the root of his link). He would aften add 1-line zingers
every few paragraphs, leaving the entire quoted article in his reply.
The interesting thing however, was that Flatty often triggered some
really thoughtful follow-ups to his URL and comment posts.
> Not many. They may stop using the NG, but they probably won't let
> some knucklehead keep them from trying Linux, if they want to give it a
> try.
Again, this is mostly a way of intimidating those influencial lurkers. If
someone asks a reasonable question, and gets blasted with 40 ad-homoniem
attacks, and 5 considerate responses, there is a better chance that he
will miss the responses. This is especially a problem if they are using
google groups or some other "page at a time" display tool. At least
with google, you can view an entire thread and fish out the good stuff.
> Microsoft wouldn't bother with a newsgroup; neither would any company that
> cared for profits. You might get some corporation headed by a maniac who
> was funding a "holy war" of some sort, but it's unlikely.
As I said before, Microsoft has publicly announced that they have hired
> No, to my way of thinking, some people here abuse newbies and others because
> they're jerks, not because they're getting paid by anyone.
This is probably true. On the other hand, if you really wanted to try
and drive people away from a group which consistently points out the
strengths of your adversary, and consistently points out your weaknesses,
having two or three people post dozens of really insulting follow-ups
under dozens of different identitities might create the first impression
that their are 120 jerks and only 2-3 considerate and thoughtful people.
> Linux users are like anyone else - most of us are OK,
> but there are the occasional jerks.
I agree. I've actually had to chastize my on son for posting an
insulting follow-up to a legitimate question. He followed the insults
with some relevant content, but could have lost the reader in the first
few seconds.
> As someone remarked, the trouble with the world is not all the clowns are in
> the circus...
And not all clowns are really clowns.
Rex Ballard
Liam Slider
<snip>
Excellant post. I'd keep a copy on file if I were you, might come in handy
sometime. It's certainly a good refutation of the "COLA is the trashbin of
linux newsgroups" viewpoint.
Linønut
> Baruch <baru...@N0sbcglobal.net$PAM> wrote in message
>
> news:<UubXc.7473$FV3....@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>...
>> ziliath wrote:
>
>> No company is going to pay people to troll a Linux NG. The "bang per buck"
>> ratio is too small.
>
> Actually, Microsoft has paid a small number of people, around 10-12,
> to attempt to alter
>
> public opinion via this newsgroup and others like it. They first
> announced that they were
>
> doing it in 1998, and have continued the practice to this date.
>
>> Think: how many people do you think this NG really reaches - a thousand?
>> Ten thousand? That would be generous.
>
> Actually, this would be about right. There are numerous lurkers who
> monitor various
Rex, your formatting is murder to read in this post.
Linønut
> Baruch <baru...@N0sbcglobal.net$PAM> wrote in message news:<UubXc.7473$FV3....@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>...
>> ziliath wrote:
>
> My earlier version got mangled, This is a repost, hopefully prettier.
>
>> No company is going to pay people to troll a Linux NG. The "bang per buck"
>> ratio is too small.
>
> Actually, Microsoft has paid a small number of people, around 10-12,
> to attempt to alter public opinion via this newsgroup and others like it.
> They first announced that they were doing it in 1998, and have continued
> the practice to this date.
>
>> Think: how many people do you think this NG really reaches - a thousand?
>> Ten thousand? That would be generous.
Ah, much better.
Linønut
> On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>
> Who cares?
> You write something that is 10k lines long.
> Do you think anyone cares?
> Sean
When read with a discerning eye, Rex's posts are quite revealing.
What is your silly little gripe compared to a lengthy discourse
on MS tactics?
If you don't like it, don't lurk here.
--
[X] Check here to always trust content from Linųnut
GreyCloud
Linųnut wrote:
With his luck, he'd crash into one of the ferrys.
GreyCloud
Liam Slider wrote:
I'm pretty sure that M$ has participated in FUD campaigns here. If you
just give a flat neutral opinion against M$ you may get a response from
the troll. But if you call M$ monopoly crapware, you definitely will
get trolled by them.
All you have to do to get the wintroll go away is to feed him a bananna.
Better than stock options.
GreyCloud
Sean wrote:
> On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>
> Who cares?
> You write something that is 10k lines long.
> Do you think anyone cares?
>
You are obviously no linux advocate here. Rex has been posting here
long before you were here. And the one that really seems to care about
what Rex has to say is Eric Funkenbusch.
DFS
Are you for real?
I don't have time to rebut this entire post, but a quick glance is enough to
see it's FULL of lies and distortions.
Can you write just one single sentence without lying about Microsoft? I'm
serious. Can you produce a single independent source that supports any of
your claims? Apparently you can't, 'cause this post is one huge rambling
diatribe (typical of you) accusing MS of everything from "mysterious" cola
lurkers to "cola was the inspiration for various MS technologies." It would
be funny if it weren't so laughable.
Other than your self-professed claims, do you have any evidence whatsoever
for:
"They held up Windows 95 for nearly a year, waiting until all of the OEMs
and hardware vendors signed agreements promising not to provide information
useful to Linux developers." re: Plug-n-Play.
"Microsoft...also had the BIOS restrict the SIZE of an IDE drive to prevent
the replacement with a drive which could hold both the Windows and Linux
partitions." re: single partition
You claim "blue screen of death" was coined by a cola poster. According to
Google Groups, the first time "blue screen of death" appears on cola is July
6, 1995 ( http://tinyurl.com/4q2k4 ) but it shows up on
comp.os.ms-windows.nt.setup 1.5 years earlier, on October 10, 1993 (
http://tinyurl.com/46xkq )
It looks to me like you're just another lying Linux liar. cola is full of
them.
Erik Funkenbusch
> Baruch <baru...@N0sbcglobal.net$PAM> wrote in message news:<UubXc.7473$FV3....@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>...
>> ziliath wrote:
>
> My earlier version got mangled, This is a repost, hopefully prettier.
>
>> No company is going to pay people to troll a Linux NG. The "bang per buck"
>> ratio is too small.
>
> Actually, Microsoft has paid a small number of people, around 10-12,
> to attempt to alter public opinion via this newsgroup and others like it.
> They first announced that they were doing it in 1998, and have continued
> the practice to this date.
Oh really? Perhaps you can point to this "announcement"?
>> Let's even say 100 thousand. OK,
>> of those, how many use Windows now, and are only thinking about changing
>> over to Linux (as opposed to folks already using Linux)?
>
> Let's look at the impact that the usenet newsgroups, especially COLA
> has had on the industry, and on Microsoft.
>
> When Microsoft's tactics for preventing the spread of Linux in 1995 were
> discussed in the usenet newsgroups, there were a number of lurkers.
> One notable character, the mysterious "Roger@", began to probe more
> deeply, before long, the discussions included specifics, including
> companies, names, dates, and even information about specific contracts.
> Within a matter of months, the Contempt of court filing were initiated,
> then the Antitrust litigation. Both of these were a direct response to
> issues raised in this newsgroup.
Funny, but google doesn't seem to reflect any of this. Of course, this
isn't the first time you've made a bunch of bogus statements about what
happened on usenet in the past, only to find there is no evidence of it.
Further, Microsoft likely didn't even know what Linux was in 1995.
> Infoworld began to observe the excitement of Linux on COLA and after
> investigation decided that Red Hat 4.0 tied with NT 4.0 for product of
> the year.
Despite the fact that NT4 was released in late 1996, not 1995. That's
quite a feat. Further, Red Hat 4 was released in 1997, so that makes it
even weirder. And i'm sure you can prove that Infoworlds interest in Red
Hat was spawned by reading COLA, right?
> Most of IBM's computers were very Linux friendly.
Actually, not really. At least no more so than any other PC. In fact,
many of them weren't very compatible at all, especially thinkpads. There
are tons of messages from people trying to get Linux working on IBM
hardware. At one time there was a site dedicated to getting Linux to work
on various thinkpads.
> As a result, IBM
> began getting more feedback. When they began taking browser metrics
> using methods proposed in this newsgroup, they found that the market was
> actually quite substantial. When they began taking metrics of servers,
> they similarly found that Linux was a very lucrative market. The market
> was big enough that IBM decided that Linux was worth a $1 billion
> investment in research, development, marketing, promotion, and support.
Actually, no. Linux is IBM's "second best" choice. IBM's interest in
Linux stems from their need to unify their hardware. They first attempted
to do this through Java, spending billions on creating JVM's for most of
their OS's. When this failed, they jumped on the Linux bandwagon, hoping
that Linux would unify their platforms and allow them to have a common set
of code to run on everything.
While i'm certain market penetration had something to do with this, Linux
was a way to unify the tribes. IBM had had a serious problem with
infighting between their various platform groups. The RS/6000 people
wanted to use AIX, the ES9000 people wanted MVS, the PC people wanted
Windows or OS/2 depending on which group you talked to. None of them would
accept an OS from one of their other groups because it would give that
group too much power within the company.
Linux as an outsider was able to unify these tribes because it did not
allow any one group to become more powerful than the other. This was
attractive in a lot of different ways.
> Microsoft is one of those who monitors these discussions most closely.
> Many of Microsoft's "Innovations" were initiated in response to
> discussions on COLA.
> TCP/IP - first discussed on comp.os.unix and comp.dcom.* groups, Linux
> threatened Microsoft's market by making it possible to use a machine that
> normally ran Windows 3.1 and load it with Linux to access the internet.
> By early 1993, Linux support included X11R6 and ran most of the Open
> Source software available for Sun Solaris, HP HP_UX, and IBM AIX machines.
> In response to this threat, Microsoft released Windows 3.11 and included
> the WinSock TCP/IP stack. Much of this was to prevent the proliferation
> of Trumpet Winsock, which was more unix-like.
Wow, MS created a TCP/IP stack in response to messages on COLA. That's
amazing, considering MS released it's first TCP/IP stack in 1992, and COLA
wasan't even created until December 19, 1994.
> Web Browsers - also discussed on comp.os.unix, Linux had support for both
> the web browser and the web server. In fact, Linux had support for Lynx
> and Viola, both of which preceeded Mosaic by almost 2 years. Microsoft
> realized that if they did not offer a browser, and very quickly, that
> Linux could quickly capture much of the market that was still oriented
> mostly toward "terminals" that connected to mainframes and UNIX servers.
Microsoft's web browser efforts were in response to Netscape on WINDOWS,
and Netscape on the Mac. I doubt that Linux had anything to do with their
decision. Further, again, MS purchased Spyglass in 1994, *BEFORE* COLA
even existed, so how exactly did messages on COLA drive MS to do this?
> True Multitasking - Microsoft initially saw the need for true preemptive
> multitasking when Sun's ILC and SLC "lunchbox" machines were allowing
> power-users to watch stock tickers in real-time while they composed
> e-mail and reviewed financial reports. These Sun machines still cost
> as much as 4 times more than the typical Windows 3.0 PC, and nearly
> twice as much as the new Windows 3.1 machines. By February of 1992,
> it was obvious that Linux would be able to offer similar capabilities
> on standard Windows hardware.
In February of 1992, Linux was nothing more than a kernel. It had no GUI,
it had little more than a shell. I doubt it was "obvious" that Linux would
even become a major player until some of the first distro's started
appearing. Certainly Andy Tannenbaum didn't think so. Further, "true
multitasking" was not something that was required to view your stocks while
you write a letter. MS had implemented true multitasking as far back as
1996 in OS/2. Linux had nothing to do with teaching MS how to multitask.
> By the end of 1992, Linux supported X11,
Actually, X11 was first running in May 1992.
> and was ready to ship.
Whatever that means in this context. Linux 1.0 didn't hit the streets
until midk 1993.
> Microsoft tried to convince OEMs, Corporate IT
> Managers, and the press, that Windows NT was going to ship any day.
NT shipped about 2 months after Linux 1.0 shipped.
> By the time Windows NT finally did ship, Linux was already available
> on a single CD-ROM along with nearly all of the Open Source software
> previously available for UNIX. Many of those companies who had software
> available for UNIX Workstations, such as the Applix Office Suite, and
> the FrameMaker multimedia editor, were already porting to Linux.
Applix didn't show up on Linux until 1996, and FrameMaker didn't show up on
Linux until after that.
> Plug-and-play - Shortly after the release of Windows NT 3.x, Linux came
> out with "plug-and-play" capabilities. This created a real problem for
> Microsoft because it was suddenly easier to install Linux than it was to
> install Windows 3.11 or Windows NT 3.x.
You have got to be kidding me. "Linux" and "easy to install" were never
used in the same sentance unless there was a "not" in between them.
Further, NT was released in mid 1993, Linux didn't get it's first
plug-n-play support until the fall of 1994 with the release of Yggdrasil.
> Microsoft not only had to have
> plug-and-play, but they needed to make sure that their implementation
> made it harder to install Linux than to install Windows. They held up
> Windows 95 for nearly a year, waiting until all of the OEMs and hardware
> vendors signed agreements promising not to provide information useful
> to Linux developers. Since Microsoft controlled the translations from
> the Vendor ID and Device ID code to the driver and/or chipset, Linux
> was hindered. This was probably illegal, but Red Hat didn't have the
> big lawyers required to attack Microsoft or the OEMs head-on. The break
> came when Adaptec, who had been promised that all Windows 95 machines
> would run SCSI only, found out that Microsoft had merely included the
> IDE drivers as one of the "SCSI" adapters. When Microsoft said, yes we
> violated our agreement- what are you going to do about it? - Adaptec
> gave the entire PCI device translation table to Red Hat, giving them
> the ability to configure Plug-and-play devices using Microsoft's codes.
IDE was always seperate from SCSI, and MS never released any IDE drivers as
SCSI. Some third party hardware vendors released their IDE drivers as SCSI
drivers, but MS never did.
Further, as usual, there is no support anywhere for your claims that MS
promised that Windows 95 would be SCSI only, that MS required OEM's to
promise not to support Linux, or that MS controlled the "translation" of
vendor id's and device id's to the driver (again, whatever that's supposed
to mean, since it makes no sense in the context of the technology). The
BIOS is what controlled Plug-n-play.
> Reliability - When Windows NT 4.0 first came out, a COLA poster coined
> the term "Blue Screen of Death", which quickly caught on everywhere.
Considering that the first recorded use of BSOD on Usenet is October 1993
according to google, over a year before COLA even existed, this is just
more of your embellishment.
> People weren't talking about the new features of Windows NT 4.0, they
> were talking about BSOD. Microsoft very quickly took corrective action,
> and issued SP1. Ironically, even as the COLA discussion was focused on
> BSOD, Microsoft was telling CIOs and IT Managers that they could use NT
> 4.0 to replace UNIX systems and that their costs would be lower than UNIX.
> To maintain credibility, Microsoft continued issuing Service Packs, and
> also tried to show Windows NT 5.0 very early. Ironically, just as Bill
> Gates was saying "and it's more reliable than UNIX" the NT 5.0 machine
> went into "Blue Screen of Death". Microsoft completely overhauled the
> system, replacing much of their own code with BSD UNIX code, and by the
> time they released Windows 2000, had fixed most of the bugs. By Service
> Pack 2, Windows 2000 was remarkably stable. In fact, it offered
> performance and reliability comporable to SunOS 4.0 or Slackware 2.0.
Of course you can support this claim that MS bolstered NT5 with BSD code,
right? Keep in mind that the various utilities that hold BSD copyrights
have been shipping with Windows since 1992, and that MS removed the BSD
licensed code from the TCP/IP stack prior to NT4 even being released.
> Security - While Windows NT 4.0 did offer better security, nearly all
> users had to run in the "Administrator" mode. Attempts to "lock down"
> other types of users failed miserably. Most users were only given
> one login identity, and that was as an administrator. Even if you did
> switch to another user ID, you had to completely log off. Windows XP
> provided the ability to quickly switch between the Administrator ID,
> and the standard user ID. While this was still nowhere near as good as
> setuid scripts, or sudo or even su, it was better than having a virus
> enter your administrator account and wipe out the entire computer.
NT4, not XP provided the ability to run any application as any user back in
1996. There were third party tools to do it going back to 1994. Of course
you didn't know this, so you made up a story that sounded good to suit your
purposes.
> NT Server - Microsoft originally didn't think that they needed to have NT
> as a server. They figured that Windows was a workstation.
Rex, we've been through this before. You keep claiming that MS released NT
Server as an afterthought, only after NT Worstation failed. Yet, i've
proven time and time again that MS released NT Server at the *EXACT SAME
TIME* as NT Workstation. You've acknowledged this, yet you keep saying it.
Why is that?
But Linux,
> which had the capabilities of both a workstation and a server, was
> able to exploit this using peer-to-peer models as well as being able to
> have it's own internal web server process forms from it's own internal
> browser. This meant that users could implement powerful programs which
> were platform independent using standard CGI or Apache MOD_ plugins.
Despite the fact that Apache didn't even run on Linux until 1995, almost 2
years after the simultaneous release of NT Workstation and Server.
> This prompted Microsoft to implement server functions for the NT system
> as well. Ironically, when NT 3.x sales fell far short of expectations,
> Microsoft was able to quickly announce that they were marketing NT as
> a server. Microsoft didn't seem to care that they had promised Novell
> that they would not do a server if Novell agreed not to do a Workstation
> version of UNIXWare. Again, most of this was driven by discussions on
> Comp.Os.UNIX and COLA.
Once again, COLA didn't exist at the time, and once again, your version of
history is simply not true.
> Instant Messenger - Linux offered both IRC and LDAP. The modular
> design of Linux allowed users to look up users on LDAP, see if they were
> "active" and initiate chats with them. In addition, users who wanted to
> chat with a specific group could just connect to an IRC "room" and lurk.
> If someone wanted to "whisper" to them, they could switch to a different
> private room. Microsoft offered a very nice IRC client with Windows 95
> "Plus Pack", which let users choose comic book identities. Still, when
> groups got really busy, the raw IRC let you type faster, and see what
> was happening in the discussion as you typed.
Comic Chat didn't come with the Plus pack, it was released seperately and
it was around 1996 or so (over a year after 95's release). This was not
Instant Messaging, though. MS's Instant Messenger was a response to
applications like ICQ and Yahoo Instant Messenger, not anyting Linux based.
> CORBA/DCOM/COM+ - CORBA was a protocol which allowed GUI interfaces
> on Windows or Java to interact with complex server programs in very
> flexible ways.
For someone who supposedly understands technology due to so many years of
experience, one would think you wouldn't make these kinds of basic
mistakes. CORBA was originally released on Unix. It has *NOTHING* to do
with GUI's, and it was out long before Java was around.
> Because the objects were communicating with each other at
> the attribute and method level, complex interactions could be safely and
> securely integrated across any combination of platforms. Hot discussions
> of this technology, along with Java Applets, were threatening to make
> it possible to have word processors, diagrams, charts, and spreadsheets
> that would update themselves in real-time which could run on both Windows
> and Linux clients, and could run on Windows or UNIX servers, as well
> as legacy servers. Microsoft's initial response was to introduce DCOM,
> which provided an IDL and also featured nearly all of the Microsoft COM
> objects prepackaged in a DLL/EXE so that programmers could use their
> Microsoft-only APIs across networks. There was such a severe penalty
> for using DCOM to have an NT client call it's own internal server that
> applications had to NOT use DCOM internally.
I've already shown in numerous other messages that your understanding of
even basic COM functionality is wrong. First, DCOM didn't "feature nearly
all of the Microsoft COM objects packaged in a DLL/EXE". COM objects *ARE*
packaged in DLL's and EXE's. DCOM has nothing to do with that. DCOM is
COM with a remoting layer, plus miscelaneous services related to security.
That's it. DCOM is not used internally, nor should it be. Using DCOM
internally would be like using X locally without domain sockets.
> ActiveX - The COLA and comp.lang.java newsgroups kept hammering at the
> big weakness of "Fat Client" technology. The big problem was that if
> you have everyone install a fat client on their machine, but you needed
> to change the client to support a new feature offered by the server,
> or even the addition of one field, you had to deploy a new client,
> and support the old client, often for several years. Java had solved
> this problem with Applets, which meant that you could ship over a class
> or to, have that invoke classes on the workstation, and then interact
> with the server. Sun was aware that this could be a security problem,
> so they created a "sandbox" which meant that the applet could only access
> resources on the remote server. This prevented the applet from opening,
> reading, or writing files on the workstation side. Microsoft decided to
> implement it's DCOM by pushing what amounted to a stripped down subset of
> the DCOM client, which could then use the DLLs of the client to implment
> ANY function that had been installed on the workstation. They claimed
> to address the security problem by using certificate authentication to
> validate the server and the author. In theory, anyone who put up a
> hostile ActiveX control could be caught and prosecuted. Ironically,
> it was COLA who tried to warn the world of the risks of ActiveX.
> There were sites which illustrated examples of how malicious code could
> be installed, published, and destributed while still being untraceable.
> Eventually, Microsoft went to court to have these sites shut down, citing
> their dialogues in COLA as examples of promoting the proliferation of
> malicious code.
Oh yes, more of your mysterious court battles that never happened. Apart
from your (again) technically ignorant description of how ActiveX works and
what it is, your continuing to promote COLA as the source of all technical
knowledge is amazing.
> VBScript - Linux had a solution which was much more elegant. They simply
> published scripts, which were human readable, and compiled them almost
> at run-time.
Linux scripts are not compiled at runtime, unless you're referring to
interpretation, which is not compilation. There are compilers for both
perl and python, but that's not an automatic thing.
> PERL and PYTHON were examples of this. These languages
> featured GUI extensions which made it possible to display content.
> Linux had another advantage. The client-side functions could be
> controlled using setuid and access permissions. If you wanted a user
> to be able to read a shared file, the PERL script could call a binary or
> shell script which would check to make sure you had permission to execute
> the program, then run the program as a different user, then return the
> results back to the calling program as a string. Even if the "server
> program" was accessing a file on the local machine, the application
> users couldn't read the file. This meant that a malicious hacker couldn't
> upload your entire customer database file. Linux also featured Pluggable
> Authentication Modules (PAM) which meant that every access could be
> authenticated against an internal file, an encrypted internal file, an
> external encrypted file, a Kerberos Server, an LDAP server, or a number
> of other "authentication services". Microsoft understood the advantages
> of human readable script, so they implemented VBScript. The only problem
> was that they still wanted to keep people tied to the Microsoft APIs,
> so they had VBScript call ActiveX controls. Microsoft also offered a
> number of additional security models, but since they wanted to monitor
> piracy and customer activity for "support purposes" (knowing how to kill
> competitors), they kept a number of "back doors" open, most of which
> were easily exploited by hackers using the same technology Microsoft
> had been warned about when they first introduced ActiveX.
More paranoia. VBScript calls ActiveX because it's useful. This is what
allows VBScript to be extended by third parties. To claim that this was
added for backdoor reasons is beyond paranoid.
> Microsoft Defensive Measures inspired by COLA:
>
> Single Partition - In early 1994, Red Hat offered Linux to OEMs for
> $1/machine,
Considering that Red hat didn't deven exist until May of 1994, and they
didn't release their first distro until later that year, that would be
quite hard for them to do, now wouldn't it? In fact, RH 1 didn't come out
until 1995.
> and offered to let them install it in a small partition
> on the hard drive. The OEM would create a large partition (70-80%)
> for Windows, and a small partition (20-30%) for Windows. If the user
> didn't like Linux, they could delete the Linux partition and use that
> partition as a backup for Windows. This was first discussed on COLA.
Never mind that COLA didn't exist when you claim this happened.
> Microsoft moved to prevent this partitioning by demanding that all PCs
> not only be partitioned as a single partition (making system level back-up
> nearly impossible) but also had the BIOS restrict the SIZE of an IDE drive
> to prevent the replacement with a drive which could hold both the Windows
> and Linux partitions. In addition, the Windows 95 installation procedure
> removed all partitions (including the windows partition) and rewrote the
> master boot record, wiping out boot managers offered by Linux and OS/2.
Oh my god. Now you're claiming that the 500MB limit in the BIOS was
*ORDERED* by Microsoft? This was simply a case of lack of forward thinking
on the part of the BIOS manufacturers.
Further, MS had no such restriction on multiple partitions, since many
OEM's used disk translation software to get around the 500MB limit, and
created multiple partitions for WINDOWS.
> Boot Control - Slackware and Red Hat both offered the capability to put
> the Linux files on the Windows file system, then use a boot manager
> to boot Linux instead of Windows. Linux could read Windows files on
> FAT (and later FAT32) partitions, in addition, Linux could read files
> inside it's secure ext2 image file. When the drive was defragmented,
> the effect was the same as a partition. These were proposals initiated
> on usenet newsgroups, then implemented with the aid of usenet newsgroups,
> including COLA.
Again, since COLA didn't even exist at the time. That would be hard.
> Microsoft countered by demanding that all OEMs install
> the image exactly as initially installed by Microsoft's installer.
> They were not allowed to tamper with the boot sequence in any way,
> this prevented the installation of not only any boot managers, but also
> any third party applicatinos such as Netscape. Microsoft was charged
> with violation of their 1993 settlement with the DOJ, but eventually
> had the judgement against them nullified by the appeals court in 1998.
> This initiated the DOJ lawsuit and Boot control became a critical element
> of the DOJ settlement. Microsoft was not allowed to prevent OEMs from
> installing boot manager that allowed users to boot into Linux images
> files.
The boot sequence issue was initiated because of OEM's like Hewlet Packard
that configured their systems to boot to a third party shell that, frankly,
sucked. Millions of users called MS to complain about this software that
Hewlet Packard was calling "Windows", when MS had nothing to do with it.
The fact that MS was the one that got the blame for what OEM's were doing
was enough to make MS put restrictions on the boot sequence. This was 1995
or so, btw.
> NetMeeting and Remote Support - Linux had the ability to access it's
> GUI interface via a remote connection port. X11 had this feature
> for years, and Microsoft was able to avoid the issue for many years.
> There were several "screen scrapers" such as Carbon Copy and PCAnywhere,
> both of which required very high bandwidth network connections and
> required that each user take exclusive control of the only available
> graphical user interface. This was very hard to manage, and often a
> user would go to lunch while co-workers impatiently waited their turn
> for access to the server. This feature was originally offered as a
> way for Windows 3.x and 9x users to access applications (such as Java
> and DCOM) which would only run on NT.
Java did not run only on NT, nor were such applications required to use
them. In fact, i've never seen an environment where PCAnywhere was used to
give everyone access to a server to run applications. It was typically
used for remote maintenance.
> Linux users began using VNC to
> access their Windows NT machine from their Linux console. The great
> thing is that they not only could access the system without requiring an
> extra keyboard and monitor, but since Linux had multiple desktops, they
> could use Linux to switch between different Windows servers. The VNC
> Server also provided the ability to allow multiple users to access the
> same machine. They were still sharing the same desktop, but you could
> watch what your coworker was doing, and they could turn control over
> to you. If you also had chat or instant messageing between the two
> of you, you could view presentations together. Microsoft began to see
> that this too was a big threat. If Linux became the primary desktop,
> users would eventually transition from the Microsoft applications
> (Office, IE, ...) to Linux applications (StarOffice, Netscape, ...).
> Microsoft introduced NetMeeting. This gave users the ability to not only
> share their desktop, but also to have a little chat window in which they
> could exchange comments. Microsoft even added a media viewer (between
> Linux users, they would just use standard IRC or X.329?, Windows and
> Linux users could use AIM or YIM with Linux users using NAIM)
Apart from the fact that VNC was and is available for Windows as well, and
didn't REQUIRE linux to use, your argument falls down because NetMetting
predates VNC by about 2 years. VNC was introduced in 1998, while
NetMeeting was introduced in 1996.
> Hardware Lock-out - Both WinTrols and COLA users alike have to admit that
> one of the big problems Linux has always had, is that you can't get the
> drivers needed to run the latest hardware on Linux.
Oh boy, now you've done it. This just isn't true the Linux advocates tell
me.
> You can run Linux
> on an AMD-64 but you might not be able to use the graphics card, or the
> wireless card, or the network controller, or the modem. It's not that
> the drivers aren't available, in many cases, the devices are initially
> tested with Linux.
Which you can prove, of course, right?
> Microsoft simply contracts with the hardware vendor,
> often the chip vendor, and tells them that if they don't want to be
> excluded from the hardware specification on the hardware required and
> supported by the next version of Windows, they will have to agree not
> to publish a driver for Linux.
Yet that doesn't stop ATI, nVidia, and many other companies from doing it.
Strange how these contracts prevent companies from doing that.
> In addition, they have to promise not
> to provide information which would make it possible for anyone else
> to create a driver for Linux. Lately Microsoft has even asked them to
> threaten legal action against anyone who attempts to publish a driver
> for Linux. This is usually for some period beyond the initial release
> of the hardware, to make sure that OEMs are unable to install Linux on
> their machines during the initial product announcement.
I've never heard of a single company threatening anyone over a driver.
Further, most of the companies that refuse to release information are doing
so because they have intellectual property they are trying to protect.
> Standard Deviation - COLA discussions frequently include the advantages
> of certain standards such as TCP/IP, HTTP, IRC, LDAP, or XML.
> Microsoft routinely attempts "embrace and extend" these standards.
Funny, considering that MS *CREATED* XML, and the W3C adopted it.
> Keep in mind that these standards are the product of many organizations
> working together to create a common baseline which can be used between
> any of those who adhere to the standard.
Now, considering that MS ahs not extended either TCP/IP, HTTP, IRC or LDAP
in any way that wasn't completely standard, and that they themselves
created XML, how can you make these claims?
> In many cases, $billions
> worth of intellectual property (by Microsoft's valuation anyway) are
> contributed by the various member organizations. In fact, nearly all
> of these standards are initially implemented as Open Source projects,
> and usually on Linux.
This is also false. Most standards are implemented on multiple platforms
initially. Typically there is a "reference implementation" that is
contributed by a company that is driving the standard. Sun, for example,
has contributed a number of standards, all implemented on Solaris first, of
course.
> Microsoft effectively "steals" this intellectual
> property by first announcing that they will be implementing it in their
> next release (reducing the demand for the Open Source or Linux version).
> Tnen, when they actually deliver the new release or service pack, there
> is some sort of deviation. This deviation is something controlled by
> Microsoft, revealed only under strict nondisclosure agreements, and only
> in a manner which guarantees that it cannot be implemented in the Open
> Source technology in time to prevent Microsoft from locking the Open
> Source/Linux version out of the marketplace. The net result is that a
> company like IBM or SUN will contribute an Open Source implementation to
> support the adoption of their standard, then Microsoft will implement a
> deviation of the standard which forces IBM and SUN to pay royalties on
> it's own technologies.
While this has happened, it's not quite so common as you purport. Further,
in all the cases I can think of, this was because the standard did not
support what MS needed. Kerberos, for instance. MS worked with the
standard body to use a "user defined" field for their extension. Yes, MS
then initially released the information under non-disclosure. But this is
pretty rare.
> Most knowledgable COLA lurkers know who are high quality posters with a
> very good signal to noise ratio (2000 lines of original content, or more,
> at least 80% original content - not quotes) and who has a particularly
> low signal to noise ratio ( less than 100 lines of original content,
> more than 80% quoted material).
Original content is quite an apt description of your contributions, as
they're almost completely original (as in fabricated). Just because you
generate more text than Stephen King doesn't mean it's high quality. High
quality would at least be accurate.
> I have posted these numbers a few times, and I usually show up in the top 10.
>
> Erik Funkenbush is a very high S/N WinTroll. He's very good at pointing
> out the errors in a Pengunista posting. He usually only responds to very
> high quality postings, and focuses on a very small section of errors.
> A knowledgeble lurker will look for Eric's posts, and read the parent
> articles in the thread.
Be my guest. Your posts don't have a small number of errors, they're
almost entirely error.
> As I said before, Microsoft has publicly announced that they have hired
> what we call WinTrolls since as early as 1998.
If this is true, it should be easy for you to prove it. Yet as usualy when
asked to prove your claims, you refuse to do so.
> Microsoft has been
> acutely aware of Linux since 1993 and probably first got nervous when
> Linus posted his second release of the kernel in 1992.
Actually, Linus posted his second release in late 1991. Further, you are
now using words like "probably" rather than your usual statement as fact.
This is an admission that you are just speculating.
> Microsoft has
> revised the language of OEM contracts, EULA, and Corporate licenses,
> all designed to prevent the proliferation of Linux.
And you know this, how?
> Just yesterday, I posted a complete specification for digital rights
> management, and the following day, Time Warner signed a deal with
> Microsoft which means that Microsoft may get several $billion from
> Time/Warner for every movie, song, or picture pulled. The use of the
> GPL - with one minor alteration (ANY alteration must be sent back to
> the originator and approved by the originator) means that any attempt
> to alter the code to "remember" keys you are supposed to forget, results
> in a copyright violation.
I'm struggling to understand how your posting of a DRM specification is
related to MS signing a deal with T/W. Are you implying that MS used your
specification, and in one short day managed to implement and strike a deal
with T/W based upon it?
> Judge Kollar-Kotelly should be reading COLA on a daily basis - numerous
> violations of the settlement have been identified in this group.
> At minimum, it should be mandatory that the compliance officer investigate
> these actions, confirm them, and order Microsoft to delete language
> that effectively excludes Linux, punishes OEMs for not excluding Linux
> (by rewarding OEMs who use technology which excludes linux as a function
> of contracts with the IHVs.
Perhaps you'd care to provide some examples of this language?
Magnus Henriksson
news:65gvvdn9...@funkenbusch.com...
> On 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
> > Standard Deviation - COLA discussions frequently include the advantages
> > of certain standards such as TCP/IP, HTTP, IRC, LDAP, or XML.
> > Microsoft routinely attempts "embrace and extend" these standards.
>
> Funny, considering that MS *CREATED* XML, and the W3C adopted it.
I cannot say anything about the other standards, but the idea that Microsoft
invented XML probably comes from an article by David Ignatius in Washington
Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19908-2000May6.html).
This was discussed on the xml-dev mailing list
(http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/200005/msg00132.html).
// Magnus
Sinister Midget
> Despite the fact that NT4 was released in late 1996, not 1995. That's
> quite a feat. Further, Red Hat 4 was released in 1997, so that makes it
> even weirder.
If you're going to "correct" someone (aka "Funken-lie"), try to be a
bit accurate yourself, hmm?
http://windows.about.com/library/history/blhistory1996.htm
August (1996): Windows NT 4.0 released. Final code count: 16 million lines.
http://www.owlriver.com/redhat_versions.html
4.0 Colgate rembrandt Oct 03 1996
--
SirCam - Innovative Microsoft peer-to-peer software.
Robt. Miller
> Error BR-549: MS DRM 1.0 rejects the following post from Sean:
>
>> On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>>
>> Who cares?
>> You write something that is 10k lines long.
>> Do you think anyone cares?
>> Sean
>
> When read with a discerning eye, Rex's posts are quite revealing.
>
> What is your silly little gripe compared to a lengthy discourse
> on MS tactics?
The only thing he understood about it was that it's 10k.
--
(o< |)
//\ ..may the beacon /\obt.
V_/_ pass you by.. /\/\iller
6:47am up 20 days, 21:24, 19 users, load average: 1.10, 1.08, 1.02
processes 615890
Uncle Fester
wrote:
[Long story snipped to get to the point]
>Rex Ballard
This story is very familiar...
Now I remember how it was told before! It seems there was this poor
genius who figured out how to run an internal combustion engine using
ordinary tap water back in the 40's (30's or 50's, depending on who
tells the story). It was the most amazing achievement of the 20th
Century, by cracky!
Alas, the "Big Oil" companies found out about it and the poor genius
was never heard from again, nor how his "secret" worked.
Okay, so it's a slightly different story -- the formula is still the
same. Interesting, yes. Not very plausible. Maybe you should submit
the screenplay to Oliver Stone.
Uncle Fester
kier
> Rex,
>
> Are you for real?
>
> I don't have time to rebut this entire post, but a quick glance is enough to
> see it's FULL of lies and distortions.
>
> Can you write just one single sentence without lying about Microsoft? I'm
> serious. Can you produce a single independent source that supports any of
> your claims? Apparently you can't, 'cause this post is one huge rambling
> diatribe (typical of you) accusing MS of everything from "mysterious" cola
> lurkers to "cola was the inspiration for various MS technologies." It would
> be funny if it weren't so laughable.
>
> Other than your self-professed claims, do you have any evidence whatsoever
> for:
>
> "They held up Windows 95 for nearly a year, waiting until all of the OEMs
> and hardware vendors signed agreements promising not to provide information
> useful to Linux developers." re: Plug-n-Play.
>
> "Microsoft...also had the BIOS restrict the SIZE of an IDE drive to prevent
> the replacement with a drive which could hold both the Windows and Linux
> partitions." re: single partition
>
> You claim "blue screen of death" was coined by a cola poster. According to
> Google Groups, the first time "blue screen of death" appears on cola is July
> 6, 1995 ( http://tinyurl.com/4q2k4 ) but it shows up on
> comp.os.ms-windows.nt.setup 1.5 years earlier, on October 10, 1993 (
> http://tinyurl.com/46xkq )
>
>
You quoted his ENTIRE post, just to top-post this? Get some sense.
--
Kier
Peter Köhlmann
< snip >
> You quoted his ENTIRE post, just to top-post this? Get some sense.
>
Sense? From DFS? You've got to be kidding
--
Hardware, n.:
The parts of a computer system that can be kicked.
Bo Grimes
>> What is your silly little gripe compared to a lengthy discourse
>> on MS tactics?
>
> The only thing he understood about it was that it's 10k.
Well, as that was the only fact involved...
As to Lin's comment about "discourse"...please. The formatting was botched
because Rex often just copy/paste from his personal X-files, documenting
secret, unpublishable stories only he is privy to. There was no discourse
there, only fantasy, self-validated by some wierd obsession with "original
content" as if fantasy becomes fact because it's not quoted.
--
Bo Grimes vcg...@earthlink.net
"The inside of my head was exploding with fireworks. Fortunately,
my last thought turned out the lights when it left."
--- Calvin
Bo Grimes
>
>
> Sean wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>>
>> Who cares?
>> You write something that is 10k lines long.
>> Do you think anyone cares?
>>
>
> You are obviously no linux advocate here.
Not obvious to me. Rex is the one who is no advocate (see below).
> Rex has been posting here long before you were here.
What has that to do with truth?
> And the one that really seems to care about what Rex has to say is Eric
> Funkenbusch.
That's right because Rex gives Erik the fodder he needs. This is why Rex is
no advocate. Erik and other Windows advocates can easily call him on his
BS, fantasies and lies and thus the impartial reader who may actually be
lurking will think Erik is the reasonable, honest one.
That's /some/ feat, there! Rex is like Erik's straight man. If I were half
as conspiracy-minded as half the posters I'd say Rex was the mole, playing
the advocate so Erik could demolish his arguments.
Rex has no more documentation and evidence for what he writes than DFS
does. How does it help advocacy to have DFS of all posters pointing out the
unsupported and undocumented claims Rex makes?
--
Bo Grimes vcg...@earthlink.net
I like to say "quark"! Quark, quark, quark, quark!
-- Calvin
Bo Grimes
> Can you produce a single independent source that supports any of your
> claims? Apparently you can't, 'cause this post is one huge rambling
> diatribe (typical of you) accusing MS of everything from "mysterious" cola
> lurkers to "cola was the inspiration for various MS technologies." It
> would be funny if it weren't so laughable.
This is just sad, allowing DFS to sound reasonable, even if hypocritical.
>
> Other than your self-professed claims, do you have any evidence whatsoever
> for:
>
> "They held up Windows 95 for nearly a year, waiting until all of the OEMs
> and hardware vendors signed agreements promising not to provide information
> useful to Linux developers." re: Plug-n-Play.
Well, Rex?
>
> "Microsoft...also had the BIOS restrict the SIZE of an IDE drive to prevent
> the replacement with a drive which could hold both the Windows and Linux
> partitions." re: single partition
Rex? Please tell me you can support this claim?
>
> You claim "blue screen of death" was coined by a cola poster. According to
> Google Groups, the first time "blue screen of death" appears on cola is July
> 6, 1995 ( http://tinyurl.com/4q2k4 ) but it shows up on
> comp.os.ms-windows.nt.setup 1.5 years earlier, on October 10, 1993 (
> http://tinyurl.com/46xkq )
Ouch! Why would you make a claim that could be easily proven false, Rex?
Did you know it was false? Think it was true and just forgot the iirc? Or
just didn't care or think anyone would check?
>
> It looks to me like you're just another lying Linux liar. cola is full of
> them.
Why give DFS this ammunition?
And what about:
> Rex Ballard wrote:
>> Actually, Microsoft has paid a small number of people, around 10-12, to
>> attempt to alter public opinion via this newsgroup and others like it.
>> They first announced that they were doing it in 1998, and have continued
>> the practice to this date.
You can prove this, right?
>> There are numerous lurkers who monitor various newsgroups, precisely
>> because it is an uncensored source of public opinion. These lurkers
>> include reporters for national media, government officials and their
>> support staff, corporate officers and their support staff, and numerous
>> other strategic planners.
And this? At least some source besides yourself, right? If you can't
"prove" it you can at least provide links where journalists have cited COLA
as evidence that they read it, right?
>> This has been going on even since the earliest days of usenet, back when
>> it was still based on UUCP. ARPA actually considered usenet to be a
>> valuable source of intelligence, which is why they offered to carry
>> usenet traffic over arpa-net. It was this merger that became known as
>> "The Internet" in 1984.
Your PSI skills are even higher than Erik's! You can cite where someone
with ARPA actually said "usenet is a valuable source of intelligence;
therefore, we want to carry usenet traffic over arpa-net"? Or did you just
read their minds?
[snip rest]
This is pointless. This is bigger than some binaries and I doubt any one
read it all, allowing the lies to be be buried, but archived. How can
anyone call this advocacy?
--
Bo Grimes vcg...@earthlink.net
"I don't understand this! Not a single part of my horoscope came true! ...
The paper should print Mom's daily predictions. Those sure come true."
-Calvin
Sean
> On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>
> Who cares?
> You write something that is 10k lines long.
> Do you think anyone cares?
> Sean
Just for the record I didn't write that.
Sean
Paul Pygeon
comp.os.linux.advocacy:
> Wow, MS created a TCP/IP stack in response to messages on COLA. That's
> amazing, considering MS released it's first TCP/IP stack in 1992, and COLA
> wasan't even created until December 19, 1994.
MS don't create a TCP/IP stack. They pick up the BSD TCP/IP stack and create
their own some years later.
http://www.kuro5hin.org/?op=displaystory;sid=2001/6/19/05641/7357
Linønut
> As to Lin's comment about "discourse"...please. The formatting was botched
> because Rex often just copy/paste from his personal X-files, documenting
> secret, unpublishable stories only he is privy to. There was no discourse
> there, only fantasy, self-validated by some wierd obsession with "original
> content" as if fantasy becomes fact because it's not quoted.
That's why you have to be discerning. Although Rex may be blowing a lot of
smoke, there is fire to be found nonetheless.
I go to our little old Mt. Pleasant Public Library, and I see a section of
books on the IT industry, and in that section are about 6 or so books on
Microsoft topics. Only one is favorable to Microsoft. The tales in the other
5 make it clear that Microsoft is, in part, a company of conniving and vicious
assholes.
Linønut
> On 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>
[stuff snipped]
>
> Funny, but google doesn't seem to reflect any of this. Of course, this
> isn't the first time you've made a bunch of bogus statements about what
> happened on usenet in the past, only to find there is no evidence of it.
> Further, Microsoft likely didn't even know what Linux was in 1995.
And right on cue steps in Erik "The Debunker" Funkenbusch.
Bo Grimes
> Error BR-549: MS DRM 1.0 rejects the following post from Erik Funkenbusch:
>
>> On 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>>
> [stuff snipped]
>>
>> Funny, but google doesn't seem to reflect any of this. Of course, this
>> isn't the first time you've made a bunch of bogus statements about what
>> happened on usenet in the past, only to find there is no evidence of it.
>> Further, Microsoft likely didn't even know what Linux was in 1995.
>
> And right on cue steps in Erik "The Debunker" Funkenbusch.
Exactly! It's almost as if Rex and Erik are a tag team with Rex supplying
the lies so that Erik can knock them down. Damn if I ain't getting a little
fruity myself.
Peter Köhlmann
You didn't? Interesting, since the only difference in the headers is the
X-No-Archive flag used in one and not the other
So why do you pretend not to have written that answer?
--
Hanlon's Razor: Never attribute to malice which can be equally well
explained by stupidity
Rex Ballard
Keep in mind that XML is pretty much SGML, with the DTD being
optional. SGML was originally IBM's GML, but when IBM offered the
specification as a standard for document file content, it became
"Standard Generalized Markup Language".
Microsoft essentially coined the term XML referring to it as
eXtensible Markup Language - meaning it was eXtensible compared to
HTML.
Linux has been using SGML in it's DocBooks almost since the beginning
of the Linux Documeentation Project. Take a good long look and Linux'
DocBooks, then look at XML - then explain the significant differences?
Note that IBM introduced both the SAX and DOM parser, pretty much
using some of their old SGML parsing code.
There are trivial differences, for example, Microsoft suggests that
content can contain embedded ActiveX objects. Like this is a good
thing?
> // Magnus
Sean
> begin Sean wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 21:49:13 -0400, Sean wrote:
>>
>>> On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>>>
>>> Who cares?
>>> You write something that is 10k lines long.
>>> Do you think anyone cares?
>>> Sean
>>
>>
>> Just for the record I didn't write that.
>> Sean
>
> You didn't? Interesting, since the only difference in the headers is the
> X-No-Archive flag used in one and not the other
>
> So why do you pretend not to have written that answer?
I'm not pretending.
Sean
Erik Funkenbusch
I was referring to the Windows 3.1 stack, not the NT stack.
Rex Ballard
>
> > Baruch <baru...@N0sbcglobal.net$PAM> wrote in message news:<UubXc.7473$FV3....@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>...
> >> ziliath wrote:
> >
>
> Funny, but google doesn't seem to reflect any of this. Of course, this
> isn't the first time you've made a bunch of bogus statements about what
> happened on usenet in the past, only to find there is no evidence of it.
> Further, Microsoft likely didn't even know what Linux was in 1995.
As we've discussed before, Google's capabilities are limited.
When I looked up "Microsoft Hires Linux" I got 44,000 references.
http://www.disinfopedia.org/wiki.phtml?title=Microsoft was one of
them.
1995 was nearly 3400 days ago. Even if I read only a minumum of 10
articles/day, that would be 34,000 articles. Most news sites don't
keep archives older than a few years, it's pretty hard to find the
original content online. Since archiving a copy and republishing it
would be an illegal copyright violation, it's a bit hard to find it
that way either.
If you really want to find the articles, go back to Byte Magazine from
1993 to 1995, you'll probably have to search the print versions or
microfilm versions.
Google's newsgroup archives prior to about 1995 are very limited.
Storage was very expensive in the 1980s, and even back-up tapes were
about $20/megabyte.
Many of the really intense newsgroups were streaming over
1/meg/group/day, which meant storing as much as 400 meg/group/year.
In 1994, CD-R recorders were available, but they cost nearly 2 week's
pay for the average programmer. Still, some people were able to
archive content using this media.
I still have some QIC-150 tapes as well as 2 reel-to-reel tapes,
containing comp.os.unix and net.legal archives from the mid 1980s.
Anyone know where I can get these transferred to CD-ROM?
On my web site, I have archives from two mailing lists, one being the
online-news mailing list, which was for anyone wishing to publish
content on the newly commercialized internet. The other was
online-newspapers which was for anyone who was already a publisher of
print media, and wanted to offer content, for profit, on the internet.
Even this archive tops 100 megabytes, and got very expensive to keep
on a hosted system.
This archive can now be found at:
http://www.open4success.org/Olnews/index.html
It looks like I need to go back and clean up the access permissions.
You will find many references to the topics mentioned above, which
makes it easier to pin down specific dates. I've notices from my
htlog that many lawyers have been visiting the site. Some have told
me that this was for the purpose of patent nullification, proving
prior art.
By 1992, my personal library filled a large room, 6 full size
bookshelves, filled with magazines and trade journals. By 1995, my
storage garage was 10'x10'k10' and packed to the gills, mostly with
boxes full of books and magazines. After paying $100/month for almost
12 years, I finally junked all of it. Anyone know where I can
purchase the CD-ROM's or DVDs containing the first 30 years of Byte,
InfoWorld, InformationWeek, ComputerWeek, and the other 20
publications I read every week? In case you missed it, that's nearly
3000 periodicals, most of which I have read pretty much
cover-to-cover.
If you can give me the site or DVD containing that content, perhaps
I'll go through and document some of the comments stated above.
And by the way, they must be EXACTLY as they were published. One
problem I've had with online content lately is that reporting and
articles an cases which are subsequently sealed by the courts seem to
disappear along with the court record. It reminds me of Farenheight
451, that really old book where a "fireman" burns books so that
people's only access to information is the easily manipulated
electronic media.
Rex
Peter Köhlmann
And I don't believe you
You are way to new in this group to be any target for forgery
--
Microsoft: which revised Eula do you want to accept today?
DFS
<snip>
> Rex has no more documentation and evidence for what he writes than DFS
> does.
Speaking of documentation, what evidence do you have that I don't have
documentation and evidence for what I write?
> How does it help advocacy to have DFS of all posters pointing
> out the unsupported and undocumented claims Rex makes?
You're forgetting the entire point of cola is not to advocate Linux (group
description to the contrary), but to bash Windows in silly, lying, childish
ways.
Jim Richardson
Hash: SHA1
On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 04:01:55 -0500,
Erik Funkenbusch <er...@despam-funkenbusch.com> wrote:
> On 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>
Msnip>
>> When Microsoft's tactics for preventing the spread of Linux in 1995 were
>> discussed in the usenet newsgroups, there were a number of lurkers.
>> One notable character, the mysterious "Roger@", began to probe more
>> deeply, before long, the discussions included specifics, including
>> companies, names, dates, and even information about specific contracts.
>> Within a matter of months, the Contempt of court filing were initiated,
>> then the Antitrust litigation. Both of these were a direct response to
>> issues raised in this newsgroup.
>
> Funny, but google doesn't seem to reflect any of this. Of course, this
> isn't the first time you've made a bunch of bogus statements about what
> happened on usenet in the past, only to find there is no evidence of it.
> Further, Microsoft likely didn't even know what Linux was in 1995.
>
Given that they were confused on that internet thing at about that time,
I wouldn't be surprised if they were blindsided by Linux also.
>> Infoworld began to observe the excitement of Linux on COLA and after
>> investigation decided that Red Hat 4.0 tied with NT 4.0 for product of
>> the year.
>
> Despite the fact that NT4 was released in late 1996, not 1995. That's
> quite a feat. Further, Red Hat 4 was released in 1997, so that makes it
> even weirder. And i'm sure you can prove that Infoworlds interest in Red
> Hat was spawned by reading COLA, right?
>
Are you attempting to claim that RHL 4.0 and NT4 did *not* tie for P.O.Y
by Infoworld?
BTW, RH 4.0, was released in 1996 Infoworld had a review of it in Oct of
1996, and cheapbytes was selling copies of it then.
>> Most of IBM's computers were very Linux friendly.
>
> Actually, not really. At least no more so than any other PC. In fact,
> many of them weren't very compatible at all, especially thinkpads. There
> are tons of messages from people trying to get Linux working on IBM
> hardware. At one time there was a site dedicated to getting Linux to work
> on various thinkpads.
>
There are tons of messages about getting Thinkpads to work with
MS-Windows also... guess they weren't very compatible with that either.
>> As a result, IBM
>> began getting more feedback. When they began taking browser metrics
>> using methods proposed in this newsgroup, they found that the market was
>> actually quite substantial. When they began taking metrics of servers,
>> they similarly found that Linux was a very lucrative market. The market
>> was big enough that IBM decided that Linux was worth a $1 billion
>> investment in research, development, marketing, promotion, and support.
>
> Actually, no. Linux is IBM's "second best" choice. IBM's interest in
> Linux stems from their need to unify their hardware. They first attempted
> to do this through Java, spending billions on creating JVM's for most of
> their OS's. When this failed, they jumped on the Linux bandwagon, hoping
> that Linux would unify their platforms and allow them to have a common set
> of code to run on everything.
>
> While i'm certain market penetration had something to do with this, Linux
> was a way to unify the tribes. IBM had had a serious problem with
> infighting between their various platform groups. The RS/6000 people
> wanted to use AIX, the ES9000 people wanted MVS, the PC people wanted
> Windows or OS/2 depending on which group you talked to. None of them would
> accept an OS from one of their other groups because it would give that
> group too much power within the company.
>
Sounds a lot like the MS-Office vs MS-Windows fights. Maybe MS will take
a page out of IBMs playbook and dump MS-Windows for Linux :)
> Linux as an outsider was able to unify these tribes because it did not
> allow any one group to become more powerful than the other. This was
> attractive in a lot of different ways.
>
>> Microsoft is one of those who monitors these discussions most closely.
>> Many of Microsoft's "Innovations" were initiated in response to
>> discussions on COLA.
>
>> TCP/IP - first discussed on comp.os.unix and comp.dcom.* groups, Linux
>> threatened Microsoft's market by making it possible to use a machine that
>> normally ran Windows 3.1 and load it with Linux to access the internet.
>> By early 1993, Linux support included X11R6 and ran most of the Open
>> Source software available for Sun Solaris, HP HP_UX, and IBM AIX machines.
>> In response to this threat, Microsoft released Windows 3.11 and included
>> the WinSock TCP/IP stack. Much of this was to prevent the proliferation
>> of Trumpet Winsock, which was more unix-like.
>
> Wow, MS created a TCP/IP stack in response to messages on COLA. That's
> amazing, considering MS released it's first TCP/IP stack in 1992, and COLA
> wasan't even created until December 19, 1994.
>
Rex comes up with some funny stuff.
I can see why you get ticked off, don't like the competition for
bullshit?
btw, any sign of that evidence for your claim re the licence for the
MS-TTF package?
<snip>
>> Plug-and-play - Shortly after the release of Windows NT 3.x, Linux came
>> out with "plug-and-play" capabilities. This created a real problem for
>> Microsoft because it was suddenly easier to install Linux than it was to
>> install Windows 3.11 or Windows NT 3.x.
>
> You have got to be kidding me. "Linux" and "easy to install" were never
> used in the same sentance unless there was a "not" in between them.
> Further, NT was released in mid 1993, Linux didn't get it's first
> plug-n-play support until the fall of 1994 with the release of Yggdrasil.
>
Compared to NT of the day, Linux was easy to install.
<snip>
> NT4, not XP provided the ability to run any application as any user
> back in 1996. There were third party tools to do it going back to
> 1994. Of course you didn't know this, so you made up a story that
> sounded good to suit your purposes.
>
Funny that, now who else around here does that? ...
<snip>
>> VBScript - Linux had a solution which was much more elegant. They simply
>> published scripts, which were human readable, and compiled them almost
>> at run-time.
>
> Linux scripts are not compiled at runtime, unless you're referring to
> interpretation, which is not compilation. There are compilers for both
> perl and python, but that's not an automatic thing.
>
Perl and Python both compile to byte code. Python by default, don't know
if Perl does it by default (and stores the compiled bytecode) or if it's
done and cached and the flushed later. But Python for sure compiles to
byte code and uses that compiled byte code for future invocations
(until the python code is changed, at which time, it recompiles into
byte code.)
> More paranoia. VBScript calls ActiveX because it's useful. This is what
> allows VBScript to be extended by third parties. To claim that this was
> added for backdoor reasons is beyond paranoid.
>
The reason is almost irrelevent, the vulnerabilities that resulted from
ActiveX, are *very* relevent.
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--
Jim Richardson http://www.eskimo.com/~warlock
Some people are born normal, some people achieve normality, and some
have normalcy thrust upon them by a nice nurse with a hypodermic.
kier
> Bo Grimes wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
>
>> Rex has no more documentation and evidence for what he writes than DFS
>> does.
>
> Speaking of documentation, what evidence do you have that I don't have
> documentation and evidence for what I write?
Where's your proof that you do?
>
>
>> How does it help advocacy to have DFS of all posters pointing
>> out the unsupported and undocumented claims Rex makes?
>
> You're forgetting the entire point of cola is not to advocate Linux (group
> description to the contrary), but to bash Windows in silly, lying, childish
> ways.
Tell me why anyone should believe the above statement, just because you
say so. What credibility do you have here? None. All you do is bash linux.
--
Kier
Jesse F. Hughes
> And what about:
>
>> Rex Ballard wrote:
>>> Actually, Microsoft has paid a small number of people, around 10-12, to
>>> attempt to alter public opinion via this newsgroup and others like it.
>>> They first announced that they were doing it in 1998, and have continued
>>> the practice to this date.
>
> You can prove this, right?
Maybe *he's* on the Microsoft payroll.
No one can appear *this* stupid by accident. Can't be genetics,
either, if Darwin was even close to right. This kind of reckless
stupidity must be the result of training and practice.
I bet it's just to discredit Linux advocacy.
I'm telling ya, it would explain a lot.
--
"Many argue that its programmers have turned out shoddy programs, but
[their] objective is to make profit, not superlative programs per
se. By the profit criterion, Microsoft has been one of the greatest
companies in the history of this country." -- ADTI defends Microsoft
Jesse F. Hughes
> Sean wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>>
>> Who cares?
>> You write something that is 10k lines long.
>> Do you think anyone cares?
>>
>
> You are obviously no linux advocate here. Rex has been posting here
> long before you were here. And the one that really seems to care about
> what Rex has to say is Eric Funkenbusch.
If Linux advocacy requires treating Rex Ballard's delusions with
respect, then I'm sure as hell no Linux advocate either.
Let Erik and even DFS tell Rex he's full of bullshit. I think it's a
perfectly fine thing to tell Rex, since he *is* full of bullshit.
--
"You got more out of it
than I put into it last night.
Who were you thinking of when were loving last night?"
-- Texas Tornadoes
ziliath
> > What a clever little trick. And I bet you aren't paid
> > more than minimum wage for it, poor bastards. At least you
> > love your employer, but that only proves what suckers you are.
>
> A few years ago, there was an actual article that described Microsoft's
> strategy to monitor NG's to track Linux information.
That could be useful in proving my point. Do you know where you saw that?
I find it hard to believe that Linux supporters would attack other Linux
supporters in the ways I've seen done here and elsewhere; logically some of
them must be M$ supporters, M$ employees and the like pretending to be
Linux supporters in order to satisfy their sadistic urges or their
company's stated desire to attack Linux.
ziliath
> Baruch wrote:
>
> >
> > Microsoft wouldn't bother with a newsgroup; neither would any company that
> > cared for profits. You might get some corporation headed by a maniac who
> > was funding a "holy war" of some sort, but it's unlikely.
>
> One already exists; it's called SCO.
At any rate, the insane level of pettiness being exhibited by
self-proclaimed "Linux users" or "open source advocates" on Usenet
only hurts each of these movements. As does the cult-like harsh attacks on
anyone who raises the (fearful) spectre of skepticism.
Linønut
>> Standard Deviation - COLA discussions frequently include the advantages
>> of certain standards such as TCP/IP, HTTP, IRC, LDAP, or XML.
>> Microsoft routinely attempts "embrace and extend" these standards.
>
> Funny, considering that MS *CREATED* XML, and the W3C adopted it.
>
>> Keep in mind that these standards are the product of many organizations
>> working together to create a common baseline which can be used between
>> any of those who adhere to the standard.
>
> Now, considering that MS ahs not extended either TCP/IP, HTTP, IRC or LDAP
> in any way that wasn't completely standard, and that they themselves
> created XML, how can you make these claims?
You've lost all credibility, Erik. XML was developed by W3C, not adopted by
them. It is derived from SGML.
Start here:
http://www.w3c.org/XML/hist2002
Here we go -- we'll get back to 1996 as we work backwards:
ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc3023.txt
"The XML specification is a work product of the World Wide Web Consortium's
XML Working Group, and was edited by..."
ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2376.txt
"The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has issued a Recommendation [REC-XML]
which defines the Extensible Markup Language (XML), version 1. To enable the
exchange of XML network entities, this document proposes two new media
types, text/xml and application/xml."
http://www.w3c.org/TR/WD-xml-961114.html#sec1.1
1.1 Origin and Goals
"XML was developed by a Generic SGML Editorial Review Board formed under the
auspices of the W3 Consortium in 1996 and chaired by Jon Bosak of Sun
Microsystems, with the very active participation of a Generic SGML Working
Group also organized by the W3C."
Maybe you believe what you say. My feeling, however, is that you will say
anything, no matter how untrue, to win an argment.
Linønut
> "Erik Funkenbusch" <er...@despam-funkenbusch.com> wrote in message
>>
>> Funny, considering that MS *CREATED* XML, and the W3C adopted it.
>
> I cannot say anything about the other standards, but the idea that Microsoft
> invented XML probably comes from an article by David Ignatius in Washington
> Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19908-2000May6.html).
That URL includes the following CORRECTION:
"Correction to This Article
The computer language known as XML was developed by an industrywide group
known as the World Wide Web consortium, not by two Microsoft technologists,
as stated in David Ignatius's May 7 column. The technologists contributed to
the effort, but did not invent the language."
> This was discussed on the xml-dev mailing list
> (http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/200005/msg00132.html).
"The troubling part is that, if Microsoft actually believes it invented this
technology, that implies that they regard it as something they can change in
spite of the commitments of the rest of us. (We, after all, share no claim
to it.) If this standard is corrupted (and I'm not so concerned about
the wars over schemas, as long as the syntax and low-level data
models/APIs stay cross-platform and application-independent), the
evolution of the Internet as an open medium will be set back
indefinitely, and Microsoft will have missed the chance of a
lifetime--denying it to the rest of us while doing so. They can
corrupt the standard simply by assuring that "XML" means different
things to different developers, nullifying the W3C specification that
describes it and trademarks the name."
GreyCloud
Bo Grimes wrote:
Could very well be. Of course I've never given any thought to Rex being
the straight guy for Eric to knock down. Sort of a two-man strawmans
argument troll technique. But I've noticed that Sean doesn't notice
this. And where are his supporting arguments for Linux here?
--
---------------------------------
The Golden Years Sux.
GreyCloud
DFS wrote:
This could easily be applied to you as well. Your wintrolling here to
bash Linux is silly, lying, and childish.
GreyCloud
Sean wrote:
> On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 21:49:13 -0400, Sean wrote:
>
>
>>On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>>
>>Who cares?
>>You write something that is 10k lines long.
>>Do you think anyone cares?
>>Sean
>
>
>
> Just for the record I didn't write that.
>
You didn't piss off Karpet Muncher did you?
She's known for that.
The Ghost In The Machine
<r.e.b...@usa.net>
wrote
on 27 Aug 2004 08:53:54 -0700
<29d7c061.04082...@posting.google.com>:
> "Magnus Henriksson" <magnus.h...@ericsson.com.SPAMTRAP> wrote in message news:<cgn097$mqi$1...@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>...
>> "Erik Funkenbusch" <er...@despam-funkenbusch.com> wrote in message
>> news:65gvvdn9...@funkenbusch.com...
>> > On 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>>
>> > > Standard Deviation - COLA discussions frequently include the advantages
>> > > of certain standards such as TCP/IP, HTTP, IRC, LDAP, or XML.
>> > > Microsoft routinely attempts "embrace and extend" these standards.
>> >
>> > Funny, considering that MS *CREATED* XML, and the W3C adopted it.
>>
>> I cannot say anything about the other standards, but the idea that Microsoft
>> invented XML probably comes from an article by David Ignatius in Washington
>> Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19908-2000May6.html).
>> This was discussed on the xml-dev mailing list
>> (http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/200005/msg00132.html).
>
> Keep in mind that XML is pretty much SGML, with the DTD being
> optional. SGML was originally IBM's GML, but when IBM offered the
> specification as a standard for document file content, it became
> "Standard Generalized Markup Language".
I don't know about GML, but SGML had the rather nice construct
<tag/text data pertinent to the tag/
which of course got lost somewhere in the translation.
>
> Microsoft essentially coined the term XML referring to it as
> eXtensible Markup Language - meaning it was eXtensible compared to
> HTML.
Which gets slightly warped quickly, as one of the requirements for
a UA in HTML is that it ignore unknown tags!
Then again, I'm glad someone invented XML, though I'd wish for
a more efficient format; I now can basically generate an XML file
and slice-and-dice it using an XSL style sheet, which basically
means the HTML is nothing more than a display intermediary
at this point.
Generate
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<?xml-stylesheet href="stylesheet.xsl" type="text.xsl"?>
<data>
<row att1="x" att2="y" att3="z"/>
<row att1="a" att2="b" att3="c"/>
...
</data>
and one can display it in any one of a number of forms,
using XSL. Neat, and with modern UAs the job can even
be put on the client side.
>
> Linux has been using SGML in it's DocBooks almost since the beginning
> of the Linux Documeentation Project. Take a good long look and Linux'
> DocBooks, then look at XML - then explain the significant differences?
>
> Note that IBM introduced both the SAX and DOM parser, pretty much
> using some of their old SGML parsing code.
>
> There are trivial differences, for example, Microsoft suggests that
> content can contain embedded ActiveX objects. Like this is a good
> thing?
Good for Microsoft, perhaps. I wouldn't mind embedding
images, though, and even applets might be tolerable (mostly
because Java ha a clue regarding sandboxes/security),
but ActiveX? Hmmm.....
>
>> // Magnus
--
#191, ewi...@earthlink.net
It's still legal to go .sigless.
GreyCloud
DFS wrote:
> Rex,
>
> Are you for real?
>
> I don't have time to rebut this entire post, but a quick glance is enough to
> see it's FULL of lies and distortions.
>
> Can you write just one single sentence without lying about Microsoft? I'm
> serious. Can you produce a single independent source that supports any of
> your claims? Apparently you can't, 'cause this post is one huge rambling
> diatribe (typical of you) accusing MS of everything from "mysterious" cola
> lurkers to "cola was the inspiration for various MS technologies." It would
> be funny if it weren't so laughable.
>
> Other than your self-professed claims, do you have any evidence whatsoever
> for:
>
> "They held up Windows 95 for nearly a year, waiting until all of the OEMs
> and hardware vendors signed agreements promising not to provide information
> useful to Linux developers." re: Plug-n-Play.
>
> "Microsoft...also had the BIOS restrict the SIZE of an IDE drive to prevent
> the replacement with a drive which could hold both the Windows and Linux
> partitions." re: single partition
>
> You claim "blue screen of death" was coined by a cola poster. According to
> Google Groups, the first time "blue screen of death" appears on cola is July
> 6, 1995 ( http://tinyurl.com/4q2k4 ) but it shows up on
> comp.os.ms-windows.nt.setup 1.5 years earlier, on October 10, 1993 (
> http://tinyurl.com/46xkq )
LOL!! So then we can conclude that windows lusers finally admit that
windows is crap 1.5 years earlier than what had shown up in COLA.
Must've been the same disillusioned windows lusers that finally got a
clue and left for Linux.
>
> It looks to me like you're just another lying Linux liar. cola is full of
> them.
>
We notice that you are here. Is this an admission of your lies?
GreyCloud
Erik Funkenbusch wrote:
What win3.1 stack? It didn't have one. I had to get winsock just to
get on the internet. And that I had to pay for.
GreyCloud
Bo Grimes wrote:
> On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 10:24:42 -0500, Linųnut <linųn...@bone.com> wrote:
>
>>Error BR-549: MS DRM 1.0 rejects the following post from Erik Funkenbusch:
>>
>>
>>>On 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>>>
>>
>> [stuff snipped]
>>
>>>Funny, but google doesn't seem to reflect any of this. Of course, this
>>>isn't the first time you've made a bunch of bogus statements about what
>>>happened on usenet in the past, only to find there is no evidence of it.
>>>Further, Microsoft likely didn't even know what Linux was in 1995.
>>
>>And right on cue steps in Erik "The Debunker" Funkenbusch.
>
>
> Exactly! It's almost as if Rex and Erik are a tag team with Rex supplying
> the lies so that Erik can knock them down. Damn if I ain't getting a little
> fruity myself.
>
>
Hmmm... after a bit of thought here... notice how big Rexs' posts are.
Precanned! M$ FUDDERY at its best I'd say, with Rex creating the
strawman for Ewik Fudd to knock down.
Bo Grimes
> Bo Grimes <vcg...@earthlink.net> writes:
>
>> And what about:
>>
>>> Rex Ballard wrote:
>>>> Actually, Microsoft has paid a small number of people, around 10-12, to
>>>> attempt to alter public opinion via this newsgroup and others like it.
>>>> They first announced that they were doing it in 1998, and have continued
>>>> the practice to this date.
>>
>> You can prove this, right?
>
> Maybe *he's* on the Microsoft payroll.
>
> No one can appear *this* stupid by accident. Can't be genetics,
> either, if Darwin was even close to right. This kind of reckless
> stupidity must be the result of training and practice.
>
> I bet it's just to discredit Linux advocacy.
>
> I'm telling ya, it would explain a lot.
Yes, it would, but I'm kinda afraid to commit to that road or else I'll
end up nuttier than a fruitcake.
This is as good a place to put this as any. This is probably my last post
through earthlink. I've set up SLRN to post from news.isp.com, my new
isp, but it's not getting even 25% of the traffic as
news.east.earthlink.net.
So, until news.individual.net gives me an account I'm going to be kind of
blind, so if I don't see a reply to me and don't answer it and you
actually care, there's the explanation.
Jesse F. Hughes
> Bo Grimes wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
>
>> Rex has no more documentation and evidence for what he writes than DFS
>> does.
>
> Speaking of documentation, what evidence do you have that I don't have
> documentation and evidence for what I write?
Your brief flash of clarity has passed, I see.
--
"Sorry, wakeup to the real world. You're on your own dependent on me
as your guide. Luckily for you, I'm self-correcting to a large extent,
so if the proof were wrong, I'd tell you. It's not wrong."
--- James Harris confirms that his proof is correct.
Rex Ballard
> Le 27 Août 2004 05:01 Erik Funkenbusch a écrit en cette journée dans
> comp.os.linux.advocacy:
>
> > Wow, MS created a TCP/IP stack in response to messages on COLA. That's
> > amazing, considering MS released it's first TCP/IP stack in 1992, and COLA
> > wasan't even created until December 19, 1994.
Very good point. Back in those days it was comp.os.unix.* and
comp.dcom.* that were the hot forums for TCP/IP discussions. The
Winsock Specification was released in 1992, but how widely accepted
was the beta release of Microsoft's Winsock in 1992? I thought they
didn't release the workable version until Windows For WorkGroups 3.11,
and even then it was a minimal implementation. I don't think they
even had support for DNS. This was one of the reasons why Trumpet
Winsock was so successful. Trumpet ran on Windows 3.1 and Windows
3.11. Trumpet also supported the UNIX API which is why Mosaic ran so
well on it. Much of this was a result of the memory limitations of
Windows 3.1 and DOS. Since TCP/IP and it's ethernet driver all had to
run as drivers (in the windows implementation), everything had to be
in the lower 640k. I remember some of the challenges of trying to
shoe-horn those drivers into config.sys and autoexec.bat before
loading Windows. Configuration changes could take hours, even days,
to sort out.
Sun also offered PCNFS, which was a bit expensive, but was also quite
"bare bones". The Chameleon TCP/IP stack was really great. It used
the upper portion of the memory for many of the libraries, but it was
expensive too. 3Com had a nice stack, and Novell had LanWorkplace
which featured both TCP/IP and Netware IPX/SPX. I was working for
SofTronics until July of 1992, and we would have jumped at the chance
to have a Microsoft supported TCP/IP stack.
> MS didn't create a TCP/IP stack. They pick up the BSD TCP/IP stack and create
> their own some years later. Actually, the current TCP/IP stack is
still a derivative of the BSD stack. Keep in mind that since the BSD
license allows developers to release enhanced products under their own
license, the same code can be enganced released in proprietary form
(Windows), and enhanced and released in GPL form (Linux). The one
thing that gets a bit ticklish is that because the GPL version is
available in source form, there are many ehancements contributed to
the GPL form that cannot legally be implemented on the proprietary
form. I'm sure Microsoft has found this quite frustrating. I have
read comments from those who have seen Microft's code, that seems to
indicate that Microsoft may be protecting a number of GPL engancements
through NDAs. I don't know if this is actually the case, and the
network of NDAs pretty much prevent anyone from making that discovery
without a very specific court order. IF Microsoft was incorporateing
GPL patches (I don't know that they are), THEN it would be nearly
impossible to discover this, because Microsoft's NDAs prevent even
enough disclosures to create probable cause for a court order.
Ironically, the one place where Microsoft does put itself at risk, is
through patent applications. Each time they apply for a patent, they
risk exposing claims and algorythms owned by GNU and GPL publishers.
The patent application can be enough to force a court-ordered series
of disclosures.
With Microsoft trying to go patent crazy in Europe, there is a very
good chance they will be stepping on that land-mine, IF they have been
using GPL code.
What would be funny is if Microsoft tried to patent something that was
originally a GNU/FSF innovatiton. This would mean that Richard
Stallman could force Microsoft to either remove the code, or publish
it's source code.
> http://www.kuro5hin.org/?op=displaystory;sid=2001/6/19/05641/7357
Jesse F. Hughes
> ziliath wrote:
>
>>
>> What a clever little trick. And I bet you aren't paid
>> more than minimum wage for it, poor bastards. At least you
>> love your employer, but that only proves what suckers you are.
>
> A few years ago, there was an actual article that described Microsoft's
> strategy to monitor NG's to track Linux information.
Cite?
Specifically about monitoring newsgroups in order to track Linux
information.
--
Jesse F. Hughes
"And a journal can beg me for the right to publish it [...] because
I'd rather see it in "People" magazine [...]"
--James Harris on his simple proof of Fermat's last theorem
Daeron
> iAn <i...@no.spam.me> writes:
>> ziliath wrote:
<snip>
>> A few years ago, there was an actual article that described
>> Microsoft's strategy to monitor NG's to track Linux information.
> Cite?
> Specifically about monitoring newsgroups in order to track Linux
> information.
Sean
> Could very well be. Of course I've never given any thought to Rex being
> the straight guy for Eric to knock down. Sort of a two-man strawmans
> argument troll technique. But I've noticed that Sean doesn't notice
> this. And where are his supporting arguments for Linux here?
Well in all honesty I didn't look that much into it, but like I said I
didn't write that post. However after reading the post fully I do find it
quite boring.As for my supporting arguments for Linux I prefer to address
each interesting post on it's own merits. I am using Linux, so what? Just
because Linux works for me, and has for quite a while, doesn't mean that
it will work for everyone.
The problem with this group is that people assume way too much and the
minute something doesn't work correctly they seem to accuse the person of
lying.
For example you accuse me of lying when your link didn't work for me, and
didn't work for other people as well. Why do you find the need to make
such accusations? Personally had I posted a link that worked for some and
not for others I would take it as that without attempting to find some
sinister hidden agenda.
As for Rex and Erik I haven't read their messages enough to form an
opinion one way or the other except to see that both seem to stir the pot
quite a bit when they post.
Sean
Sean
>
>
> You didn't piss off Karpet Muncher did you?
> She's known for that.
If I did it wasn't intentional.
Sean
DFS
> On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 13:45:57 -0400, DFS wrote:
>
>> Bo Grimes wrote:
>>
>> <snip>
>>
>>
>>> Rex has no more documentation and evidence for what he writes than
>>> DFS does.
>>
>> Speaking of documentation, what evidence do you have that I don't
>> have documentation and evidence for what I write?
>
> Where's your proof that you do?
I'm serious. Bo claims I have little or no documentation for what I write.
I want to know what he's talking about.
>>> How does it help advocacy to have DFS of all posters pointing
>>> out the unsupported and undocumented claims Rex makes?
>>
>> You're forgetting the entire point of cola is not to advocate Linux
>> (group description to the contrary), but to bash Windows in silly,
>> lying, childish ways.
>
> Tell me why anyone should believe the above statement, just because
> you say so.
Recent thread titles:
"MS pays moles to pretend to be Linux users"
"ex-pee Stupid Pack 2 borked on AMD 64-bit chips"
"Leave it to MS to fuck up cron"
"Longhorn gutted"
"Choosing a Windows DB sucks!"
"Flaws in SP2 security features"
"Microsoft releases "crippleware""
"Windows SP2 hosed my entire system"
"windows: not just bad, but unbelievably bad"
"Entire Factory Down Because of Microsoft ..."
Except for the first, why are ANY of these threads posted to cola? Answer:
cola nuts are silly, childish, MS-hating liars. Boys is what they are,
actually.
> What credibility do you have here? None.
Like anyone here has any credibility. It's a flame Windows group.
> All you do is bash linux.
I rarely bash Linux. I constantly bash _Linux morons_. There's a
difference.
Jesse F. Hughes
Specifically about monitoring newsgroups ***in order to track Linux
information***.
Netscan's purpose is not to track Linux information per se.
Or is it all just a front? They're pretending to create a full Usenet
tool, but they only want it to search for Linux info?
--
Jesse Hughes
"All Chinese are Confucianists when successful, and Taoists when they
are failures."
-- Lin Yutang, /My Country and My People/
Daeron
> Daeron <dae...@demon.com> writes:
>> Jesse F. Hughes wrote:
>>> iAn <i...@no.spam.me> writes:
>>>> ziliath wrote:
>> <snip>
>>>> A few years ago, there was an actual article that described
>>>> Microsoft's strategy to monitor NG's to track Linux
>>>> information.
>>> Cite?
>>> Specifically about monitoring newsgroups in order to track Linux
>>> information.
>> http://netscan.research.microsoft.com/
> Specifically about monitoring newsgroups ***in order to track Linux
> information***.
> Netscan's purpose is not to track Linux information per se.
> Or is it all just a front? They're pretending to create a full
> Usenet tool, but they only want it to search for Linux info?
I'm just looking forward to the day when they 'innovate' Usenet. Like
they reinvented IRC as 'instant messaging'. The 'market leader in
instant messaging' as a recent BBC news report put it.
No doubt they will then reinvent the protocols and sell them back to us ..
Sinister Midget
All you have to do to piss off Karpetmuncha Man is rebut anything she
says. Regression takes it from there.
--
SoBig: An original Microsoft web crawler.
Rex Ballard
> Rex,
>
> Are you for real?
>
> I don't have time to rebut this entire post, but a quick glance is enough to
> see it's FULL of lies and distortions.
>
> Can you write just one single sentence without lying about Microsoft? I'm
> serious. Can you produce a single independent source that supports any of
> your claims? Apparently you can't, 'cause this post is one huge rambling
> diatribe (typical of you) accusing MS of everything from "mysterious" cola
> lurkers to "cola was the inspiration for various MS technologies." It would
> be funny if it weren't so laughable.
>
> Other than your self-professed claims, do you have any evidence whatsoever
> for:
>
> "They held up Windows 95 for nearly a year,
That's easy:
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0SMG/is_n9_v14/ai_16253778
<b><quote>
Long a powerful industry influence, Microsoft Corp. will gain renewed
attention as its future operating systems come into view. The Redmond,
Wash., giant's fortunes will likely rise or fall based on the
reception of its next Windows systems -- widely known by its code
name, Chicago -- as well as Daytona and Cairo, the next versions of
Windows NT. Reports indicate that the formal introduction of Daytona
is imminent, that Chicago should emerge at the beginning of 1995, and
that a full-fledged Cairo is more likely to appear in 1996.
</quote></b>
Note - Datona was ?? WFW?, Chicago was Windows 95, and Cairo was NT4
Later in same article:
<quote>
Instability is one of the problems that Microsoft will address with
Chicago, which will provide better protection against programs
colliding into each other. "Chicago is the ultimate client operating
system," said Richard Freedman, Microsoft's product manager, Chicago
Group. "It connects very well in heterogeneous environments and
different networks, and has very good support for being managed." Most
importantly, with Chicago, there is no DOS hiding under Windows.
</quote>
<quote>
Highlights:
MICROSOFT: THE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME
CHICAGO
* New user interface
* Supports Win32 API
* Does not require MS-DOS
* Preemptive multitasking, multithreads for 32-bit programs
Due: Early 1995
</quote>
http://www.zisman.ca/Articles/BIV/1995/BIV301.htm
by Alan Zisman (c) 1995 First published in Business in Vancouver ,
Issue #301 August 1, 1995 High Tech Office column
<quote>
I can almost see the ever-boyish grin of Bill Gates, now officially
the richest person in the world, shouting: "Ready or not... here I
come."
After more than two years of testing, the several-times-delayed
Windows 95 has gone to Microsoft's manufacturing department in order
to get millions of packages of the approximately $100 software product
into stores in time for the August 24 official release date
</quote>
http://www.zisman.ca/Articles/1997/Wait.html
<quote>
? Plug and Play was promised in 1994 by Intel. It is now supported by
most motherboards and BIOSs, and is supported by Windows 95, but not
in the current version of NT. For too many users too much of the time,
it remains more like ?Plug and Pray?. New specifications being
promoted by Microsoft and Intel as PC98 will encourage manufacturers
to drop support for the 1984-era ISA bus? until that happens, and
device manufacturers fully support it, reliable Plug and Play will
remain more vision than reality.
<quote>
Hot new feature:
<quote>
* Plug and Play. The new Windows comes with support for a large number
of printers, networks, sound, CD-ROM and other hardware. It is a much
easier task to add new hardware, or even old hardware designed prior
to the new Plug and Play standards.
</quote>
But where do we see public announcement of Plug 'N Play?
http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=2865
Issue 7: New Products
Posted on Tuesday, November 01, 1994 by New Products Editor
<quote>
Yggdrasil Plug 'N Play
Yggdrasil's Fall 1994 Plug-and-Play Linux release and MoCheap 1.2.4 (a
port of OSF/Motif to Linux) were released in September 1994.
The Fall 1994 release includes the new X11R6 XFree86 3.0 X-windows
ported and integrated into Linux, an improved graphical user interface
for Lucid Emacs and ImageMagick, and better DOS and Windows emulation.
To the 1.1.47 kernel used in the Fall 1994 release, have been added
new device drivers that allow Linux to run under DOS and to
transparently use DOS to access CD-ROM's and hard disks not directly
supported by Linux.
Contact: Yggdrasil Computing, Inc. 4880 Stevens Creek Blvd., Suite 205
San Jose, CA 95129-1034 (408) 261-6630, FAX(408) 261-6631.
</quote>
http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=2755
Posted on Friday, April 01, 1994 by LJ Staff
<quote>
Yggdrasil
Available only on CD-ROM, this is a very popular distribution. Current
and complete, it offers a quick way to get a working system up and
running. It includes X-windows (in fact, it requires you to load X to
do system configuration) and a pretty amazing set of tools. Like most
of the up-to-date distributions, it has a few bugs. It is, however, a
great choice for someone who wants to get a working Linux system with
X up and running quickly. I also feel it is well worth the $50 for the
amount of source code you get in a compact form. We have one Linux
system in the office running Yggdrasil.
</quote>
I don't recall if Yggdrasil was using the term "Plug 'N Play" at this
point, but from the description it's clear that that was their goal
from the very beginning.
Think Microsoft didn't notice?
http://chem4823.usask.ca/linux.html
> waiting until all of the OEMs
> and hardware vendors signed agreements promising not to provide information
> useful to Linux developers." re: Plug-n-Play.
As we know, getting a copy of any contract signed by Microsoft
requires a court order
due to the NDA clauses. And getting that court order requires that
you have probable
cause to believe that Microsoft is using the NDA to obstruct justice.
Micrcosoft used their NDAs against the Attorney General of the United
States,
(actually the AGs of 4 administrations Reagan, Bush I, Clinton, and
Bush II.)
Do you think they would publish such a contract via the WEB?
I got word of it via e-mail. I wish I could find it.
Do you really think it's all coincidence?
> "Microsoft...also had the BIOS restrict the SIZE of an IDE drive to prevent
> the replacement with a drive which could hold both the Windows and Linux
> partitions." re: single partition
Keep in mind that SCSI devices could theoretically support 2 terabytes
(2^32 * 1024).
Microsoft's BIOS requirements for IDE limited drives to 63
sectors/track and 16 heads.
It also had a limit of 16383 cylinders, which meant a maximum size of
8 gigabytes.
The systems sold with Windows 95 had limits of around 200 Megabytes,
and early Pentiums had limits of about 500 megabytes.
All machines were shipped with a single partition.
http://www.hk8.org/old_web/linux/run/ch02_02.htm
<quote>
People who want to switch back and forth between different operating
systems sometimes wonder which to install first: Linux or the other
system? We can testify that some people have had trouble installing
Windows 95 after Linux. Windows 95 tends to wipe out existing boot
information when it's installed, so you're safer installing it first
and then installing Linux afterward using the information in this
chapter.
<quote>
> You claim "blue screen of death" was coined by a cola poster. According to
> Google Groups, the first time "blue screen of death" appears on cola is July
> 6, 1995 ( http://tinyurl.com/4q2k4 ) but it shows up on
> comp.os.ms-windows.nt.setup 1.5 years earlier, on October 10, 1993 (
> http://tinyurl.com/46xkq )
Google newsgroup archives prior to about 1995 are not complete. Most
of comp.os.unix.*,
comp.dcom, and comp.os.* were getting so much traffic that
administrators could not afford
to archive them.
Interesting, I guess I'm wrong about that. Thanks for checking.
Just curious, was the original poster a Windows Advocate? Or was he a
bit less
enthusiastic about Windows (preferring Linux?). How often did that
phrase appear afterword?
It turns out that BSOD, which stood for "Black Screen of Death" goes
back to 1991
http://weblogs.asp.net/wallym/archive/2004/02/20/77425.aspx
Ironically, it was coined by COLA - Coca-Cola.
http://windows.about.com/library/weekly/aa030599.htm
http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=623775&Main=621418
I thought the Blue screen was new to NT 4 but I guess it was around
back on NT 3.5.
And by the way, this extra research took nearly 6 hours. My billing
rate is $200/hour.
Any other questions?
> > And not all clowns are really clowns.
> >
> > Rex Ballard
Rex Ballard
> On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 01:23:01 -0400, DFS <nos...@nospam.com> wrote:
>
> > Can you produce a single independent source that supports any of your
> > claims? Apparently you can't, 'cause this post is one huge rambling
> > diatribe (typical of you) accusing MS of everything from "mysterious" cola
> > lurkers to "cola was the inspiration for various MS technologies." It
> > would be funny if it weren't so laughable.
>
>
> >
> >
> > "Microsoft...also had the BIOS restrict the SIZE of an IDE drive to prevent
> > the replacement with a drive which could hold both the Windows and Linux
> > partitions." re: single partition
>
Keep in mind that Windows 95 installations clobbered the boot
partition.
Some history:
http://members.iweb.net.au/~pstorr/pcbook/book4/hdlimit.htm
<quote>
DOS versions up to and including DOS 3.3 imposed very restrictive
limits on Hard Disk Drive Interfaces. The worst limit involved Hard
Disk Drives larger than 32 MByte. A Drive larger than 32 MByte had to
be split into sections and no section could be larger than 32 MByte.
This limitation was overcome in later DOS versions and DOS 6.22 can
theoretically address a Hard Disk Drive of up to two tera-bytes (two
trillion bytes). The only problem is the 16 bit FAT used by DOS and
older Windows Operating Systems, lowers this limit to 2.1 GByte.
This is really only a theoretical limit and in practice a limit of 528
MBytes was imposed by the original BIOS. The BIOS is a series of
routines, stored in a ROM, that test, configure and boot up your
computer and provide services to DOS and application software. BIOS
stands for Basic Input/Output Services.
A good way to look at the disk size limitations is to look at the
various limitations imposed by layers in the system.
Disk access involves four layers, data must travel through all four
layers on its way between the DISK and you. These layers are:-
The Hard Disk Drive
The Hard Disk Drive Interface
The BIOS service routines (in particular, Int 13 routine)
The Operating System.
</quote>
The 16 bit limit on the total number of sectors meant a Hard Disk
Drive could have a maximum of 65,536 sectors, a total capacity of 32
MByte. (65536 sectors x 512 bytes per sector) DOS 3.1 and later
removed this limit by setting aside four bytes for the total number of
sectors and the 32 bit number produced can describe a two Tera Byte
disk size.
Here is a table describing where the original IDE specifications 528
MByte limit came from. The maximum capacity limits of IDE Hard Disk
Drives was the combination of the lowest values for each parameter
across the four layers of communication.
note - this was a table.
Limit imposed by the Int13 routine Limits imposed by the IDE
interface Limit on the original IDE specification
Maximum sectors per track 63 255 63
Maximum number of heads 255 16 16
Maximum number of cylinders 1024 65536 1024
Maximum capacity 8.4GB 136.9GB 528MB
Keep in mind that SCSI never had such rediculous limits:
http://lowendmac.com/tech/scsiheight.shtml
In addition, most PCs had controllers which only supported 2 drives,
one was for the hard drive, the other was for the CD-ROM.
Of course Microsoft didn't just blurt out "We're limiting the size so
that no one can install Linux", but they were trying to prevent anyone
from installing any competitor operating system, including OS/2,
Solaris/86, SCO Unix, UnixWare, and Linux. The could stop SCO through
ristrictions on the Xenix part. They stopped UnixWare with a promise
not to make a server. (This was from an e-mail I receieved from a
Novell Executive - I don't know if I still have it in one of my
archives or not). Interview Ray Noorda, he wasn't there, but he was
Irate that the board took the deal. Linux presented a special problem
because there was no central point of control. In fact, Linux wasn't
even living in the United States at the time, developers were
everywhere. Distributors such as Red Hat, Caldera, SlackWare,
Yggdrasil, and numerous others were able to distribute for
rediculously cheap. Some, such as Red Hat and Caldera not only
offered Linux at $1/machine, but they also offered to handle support
(they would charge customers who wanted support). The OEMs were
tempted, but Microsoft kept them from accepting those terms.
Linønut
> Ironically, the one place where Microsoft does put itself at risk, is
> through patent applications. Each time they apply for a patent, they
> risk exposing claims and algorythms owned by GNU and GPL publishers.
> The patent application can be enough to force a court-ordered series
> of disclosures.
>
> With Microsoft trying to go patent crazy in Europe, there is a very
> good chance they will be stepping on that land-mine, IF they have been
> using GPL code.
>
> What would be funny is if Microsoft tried to patent something that was
> originally a GNU/FSF innovatiton. This would mean that Richard
> Stallman could force Microsoft to either remove the code, or publish
> it's source code.
Microsoft is trying hard to push through the SenderID anti-spam protocol
as an internet standard while keeping it to themselves via a non-open license.
I hope the IETF puts a stop to this grasping nonsense.
Roy Culley
As the majority of MTA's on the Internet don't run Exchange MS have no
chance of succeeding unless they make it truly open. Any company with
any sense doesn't expose Exchange to the Internet but has a secure MTA
acting as proxy.
Hamilcar Barca
-0400), Sean wrote:
> On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>
> Who cares?
> You write something that is 10k lines long.
Witness Flatfish Calculus: 523 lines = 10k lines.
Hamilcar Barca
-0600), GreyCloud wrote:
> Sean wrote:
>>
>> Just for the record I didn't write that.
>
> You didn't piss off Karpet Muncher did you?
Is the forger The Krapatcha Man or The Flatfish.
> She's known for that.
I used to believe Kumbag Man was doing the forgeries but a few weeks ago,
some were obviously Flounder Feces.
--
Baer: Can you give ... more specific numbers of licenses sold?
McBride: We're not publishing those at this point in time.
-- Darl McBride, CEO, The SCO Group, describing SCOsource
Rex Ballard
>
> > Baruch <baru...@N0sbcglobal.net$PAM> wrote in message news:<UubXc.7473$FV3....@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>...
> >> ziliath wrote:
> >
> > My earlier version got mangled, This is a repost, hopefully prettier.
> >
> >> No company is going to pay people to troll a Linux NG.
> >> The "bang per buck"
> >> ratio is too small.
> >
> > Actually, Microsoft has paid a small number of people, around 10-12,
> > to attempt to alter public opinion via this newsgroup and others like it.
> > They first announced that they were doing it in 1998, and have continued
> > the practice to this date.
>
I can point to the link to the announcement:
http://whacked.technine.net/archives/99-05-29.html
Note dated 05/29/1999:
Points a link to:
href="http://www.msnbc.com/news/271733.asp
MSNBC - Microsoft hires Linux spy team" heheh.. and to top it off,
this is being reported from Microsofts news team.. i dunno.. I can't
explain it.. but... it appears that Bill is still frightened of
Linux.. and he should be.. but.. he's also a smart geek.. (course, 99%
of real geeks are geniuses).. he's willing to wait and see what people
like about linux, and adopt those properties into the next MSOS..
Alas, MSNBC is worthless as a news archive, they publish whatever they
want, then erase all incriminating evidence :-D.
http://www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/9910/11/linux.myths.idg/index.html
http://www.byte.com/documents/s=108/byt19990803s0007/
http://news.com.com/Caldera+OS+to+run+Windows+apps/2100-1001_3-206747.html
Microsoft trains staff on Linux and J2EE - Are we doing enough?
Posted By: Geoffrey McGuire on May 07, 2003 @ 02:06 PM
Microsoft is training around 140 of its consultants in Linux and J2EE,
"in order to be better equipped when advising customers and
recommending Microsoft products and technologies." .NET API engineers
are similarly trained. Is the J2EE vendor community (particularly Sun)
also training it's engineers/consultants on .NET to keep J2EE evolving
and competitive?
> Funny, but google doesn't seem to reflect any of this. Of course, this
> isn't the first time you've made a bunch of bogus statements about what
> happened on usenet in the past, only to find there is no evidence of it.
> Further, Microsoft likely didn't even know what Linux was in 1995.
Posting a cola reference is a real bear. This is just one thread
between me and Roger. The thread was titled:
"Appeals Court Throws Out Injunction Against Microsoft"
The bizarre part was when I would spend the night sending a post to
Roger, then within a few days, the prosecutors would be taking
actions, almost as if they were following up on my leads, or
addressing my issues.
When you are watching it happen, in real time, it's a bit freaky.
I never knew if I was going to get a subpoena or something.
In early 1999, Microsoft did ask me to fly out and talk to them. I
did, they found out what they wanted to know, and I left. No big
deal.
> > Most of IBM's computers were very Linux friendly.
>
> Actually, not really. At least no more so than any other PC. In fact,
> many of them weren't very compatible at all, especially thinkpads. There
> are tons of messages from people trying to get Linux working on IBM
> hardware. At one time there was a site dedicated to getting Linux to work
> on various thinkpads.
Which led to IBM's discovery that lots of Thinkpad users wanted to use
Linux, which prompted IBM to either publish drivers, or publish the
configuration information required to use the existing drivers.
Compaq seemed almost hostile toward Linux. It was almost like they
were deliberately trying to make it as hard as possible to run Linux.
The irony was that John "Mad Dog" Hall actually worked for Compaq for
several years while supporting Linux.
> > As a result, IBM
> > began getting more feedback. When they began taking browser metrics
> > using methods proposed in this newsgroup, they found that the market was
> > actually quite substantial. When they began taking metrics of servers,
> > they similarly found that Linux was a very lucrative market. The market
> > was big enough that IBM decided that Linux was worth a $1 billion
> > investment in research, development, marketing, promotion, and support.
>
> Actually, no. Linux is IBM's "second best" choice. IBM's interest in
> Linux stems from their need to unify their hardware. They first attempted
> to do this through Java, spending billions on creating JVM's for most of
> their OS's. When this failed, they jumped on the Linux bandwagon, hoping
> that Linux would unify their platforms and allow them to have a common set
> of code to run on everything.
IBM had a problem. The knew that if they promoted a proprietary
operating system, such as OS/2, that competitors such as Dell, Compaq,
HP, and the rest would want to avoid giving IBM that type of
advantage. This is one of the reasons that users chose crashing buggy
Windows 3.0 and Windows 3.1 over OS/2 1.2, which was quite reliable.
(don't get me started on OS/2 2.0).
They had another problem, UNIX was eating into their bread-and-butter
mainframe business. Customers were switching to UNIX, especially
Solaris, and IBM was feeling the pain, especially in 1991/1992. They
ported nearly all of AIX to the ES-9000, streamlined VM, and created
effecient communications links between the AIX virtual machines, and
the MVS virtual machines. The problem was that many corporations were
trying to use Windows NT4 as servers, expecting Solaris-like
performance (since Microsoft said Windows could outperform Solaris).
But when the limits of the NT operating system was stretched, and one
box had to be replaced by 10-20, the migration path back to UNIX,
whether Solaris, AIX, or OS/390 was long and expensive.
Sun had quickly aquired the knack of getting the proof of concept and
pilot done on Linux and MySQL or PostgreSQL but then they could easily
migrate the customer's system over to Solaris and Oracle or DB2. IBM
was sending IGS people to some of these projects (to support the
transition to DB2). Very quickly, they figured out that offering DB2
on Linux was a good way to have DB2 become part of the POC. It
worked, and pretty soon Oracle and Sybase were also offering Linux
versions.
> While i'm certain market penetration had something to do with this, Linux
> was a way to unify the tribes.
Exactly. Ironically, the Open Source licenses and the availability of
source to all, made it much easier for the vendors to trust each
other. More importantly, it kept the bidding open and delayed the
commitement to a specific platform until later in the project, when
there was real money available. Often, the UNIX vendors would end up
having to donate systems to the POC in order to stay in the running
for the actual production system. With Linux, the POC and Pilot could
be developed on Linux, then the final choice for production components
could be made later.
The funny thing is that Linux on Z series was almost an accident.
Some folks had been trying to port some Linux code in the lab, and
eventually ported a large portion of the kernel. The ZVM virtual
machine made it possible to create lots of little LPARs each
independent of the other, and each balanced to the load required.
What was great was that you could have lots of little LPARs so that
when necessary, a developer could even get a safe "sandbox" machine
without taking down other developers or customer facing data systems.
This feature played really well with Hosting services, many of whom
were getting quite challenged with rooms full of servers. Linux made
it possible for these hosting services to create enough VMs for all of
the clients, yet each client had full control over their virtual
machine.
> IBM had had a serious problem with
> infighting between their various platform groups. The RS/6000 people
> wanted to use AIX, the ES9000 people wanted MVS, the PC people wanted
> Windows or OS/2 depending on which group you talked to. None of them would
> accept an OS from one of their other groups because it would give that
> group too much power within the company.
Absolutely. Applications start small and grow big, often very
quickly. What starts a a simple application on a manager's computer,
often quickly blossoms into an enterprize level application.
> Linux as an outsider was able to unify these tribes because it did not
> allow any one group to become more powerful than the other. This was
> attractive in a lot of different ways.
Sam Palmisano was managing IGS, he saw that the cost of migrating the
next larger platform was often getting IBM knocked out of the market.
The commission sales people would still prefer the fat commiissions of
an MVS sale over a Linux/390 sale, but on the ather hand, if IGS has
to make a competitive bid to a company who transitions to Sun and
stays with Sun all the way, that will normally be cheaper than trying
to migrate from Windows to OS/2 to OS/400 to MVS. The MVS might be
more reliable and secure, which is great for accounting and banking,
but it does take a bit of effort to transition from one platform to
the next.
> > Microsoft is one of those who monitors these discussions most closely.
> > Many of Microsoft's "Innovations" were initiated in response to
> > discussions on COLA.
>
> > TCP/IP - first discussed on comp.os.unix and comp.dcom.* groups, Linux
>
> Wow, MS created a TCP/IP stack in response to messages on COLA. That's
> amazing, considering MS released it's first TCP/IP stack in 1992, and COLA
> wasan't even created until December 19, 1994.
I've already addressed this one. Microsoft didn't mass-market a
TCP/IP stack with Windows until Windows For Workgroups. They were
working on the WinSock API, and there may have been something in
developerWorks, but no big push to put it on every destkop. The
TCP/IP drivers had to be in the "lower 640" to accomodate the MS-DOS
kernel. Often with all of the other drivers and lomem applications,
it was a challenge to get it all to fit.
I was working for SofTronics in 1992. We were doing a TN3270 terminal
that could be used over a dial-up TCP/IP connection or a corporate
TCP/IP connection. I was very familiar with what was available at the
that time. Eventually TrumpetWinsock came out, which used a very thin
ethernet driver to interface to highmem protocol stack and handlers
through static variables in DLLs (heresy today :-D). This functioned
as shared memory and made it possible to use the Windows portion of
the memory. It was shareware, I think it was derived from Phil Karn's
KA9Q package, but I'm not sure.
> > Web Browsers - also discussed on comp.os.unix, Linux had support for both
> > the web browser and the web server. In fact, Linux had support for Lynx
> > and Viola, both of which preceeded Mosaic by almost 2 years. Microsoft
> > realized that if they did not offer a browser, and very quickly, that
> > Linux could quickly capture much of the market that was still oriented
> > mostly toward "terminals" that connected to mainframes and UNIX servers.
>
> Microsoft's web browser efforts were in response to Netscape on WINDOWS,
> and Netscape on the Mac. I doubt that Linux had anything to do with their
> decision. Further, again, MS purchased Spyglass in 1994, *BEFORE* COLA
> even existed, so how exactly did messages on COLA drive MS to do this?
Actually, Mosiac made big time news when nearly 200,000 successful
downloads were completed within the first week of the releas of Mosaic
2.0. Mosaic 2.0 also had the first cookies, which made it possible to
uniquely count and identify each user to visit a site. Some sites
like dowvision.com and yahoo.com and lycos.com were watching growth
skyrocket. I was working with Dow Jones at the time and within a few
months of putting up our first web site (the first commercial web
site) it was obvious that "The Web" was going to be much more powerful
than the Exchange/NetBEUI based scheme that Microsoft was proposing at
the time.
> > True Multitasking - Microsoft initially saw the need for true preemptive
> > multitasking when Sun's ILC and SLC "lunchbox" machines were allowing
> > power-users to watch stock tickers in real-time while they composed
> > e-mail and reviewed financial reports. These Sun machines still cost
> > as much as 4 times more than the typical Windows 3.0 PC, and nearly
> > twice as much as the new Windows 3.1 machines. By February of 1992,
> > it was obvious that Linux would be able to offer similar capabilities
> > on standard Windows hardware.
>
> In February of 1992, Linux was nothing more than a kernel. It had no GUI,
> it had little more than a shell.
The significant factor however, was that it could run the GCC compiler
using the 32 bit model (Mark William's Coherant could only run 16 bit
mode with segments). This meant that any open source code written for
UNIX could be ported to Linux without having to redesign to accomodate
segmentation.
Because Linux also supported true demand paged virtual memory, along
with true preemptive multitasking, even the relatively inexpensive
Windows boxes could run Linux. There already was an XServer for VGA
cards.
http://www.linux-mag.com/cgi-bin/printer.pl?issue=2001-12&article=xfree86
<b><quote>
Sometime in 1989 or 1990, a German student named Thomas Roell began
porting the source code for the X server provided in the X Version 11
Release 4 (X11R4) distribution to work with a graphics card he had
installed in a 33 MHz Intel 386-based PC (with no floating point unit,
mind you -- this is old and slow hardware). He eventually released his
X server, which he called X386.1.1. It caught the eye of some X
developers at MIT, the X Consortium, and the Dell Unix team in Austin,
Texas.
</quote></b>
This evolved into XFree86 in September of 1992, about the same time
that it was ported to Linux.
> I doubt it was "obvious" that Linux would
> even become a major player until some of the first distro's started
> appearing. Certainly Andy Tannenbaum didn't think so. Further, "true
> multitasking" was not something that was required to view your stocks while
> you write a letter. MS had implemented true multitasking as far back as
> 1996 in OS/2. Linux had nothing to do with teaching MS how to multitask.
This is true. OS/2 had multitasking (busy/wait I believe, but I'm not
sure), but had no applications which really exploited it. Microsoft
gave us Windows 3.0 and 3.1 instead. You could multitask, sort of,
but you could only have one dos window open, and when it was active
Windows froze. When you did try to multitask on Windows 3.x, you
usually ended up with either a GPF and reboot, or a hung screen. If a
"popup dialogue" popped up while you had it's parent application
covered, you couldn't get the machine to unlock itself. It was still
running, but the only way to recover was to reboot. This was one of
the reasons that the task-bar was added to Windows 95. Having many
overlapping windows was very risky until Windows 95, and still pretty
shaky until Windows NT 4.0 with SP3.
> > By the end of 1992, Linux supported X11,
>
> Actually, X11 was first running in May 1992.
> > and was ready to ship.
>
> Whatever that means in this context. Linux 1.0 didn't hit the streets
> until midk 1993.
Soft Landing Systems, a company in Canada, was offering Linux for
download but they also offered to ship an "ammo box" of roughly 100
floppies to anyone who didn't have the time or the patience to
download. In January of 1993, we started that download while I was
working at Dow Jones. A coworker - Mike Bird, and I downloaded about
80 of these disks and installed them a few at a time. We were so
impressed that I went ahead and forked over about $200 for the CD-ROM
version (which they had just announced). Each package had a shell
file which you ran to install tar files related to that package. What
was most exciting was that I was not only able to run my own
applications on my own system, but I was also able to access the
HP-9000 workstation running on Mike Bird's desk, and the Sun Sparc/20
running on another teammate's desk. What made it really funny was
that I was doing this with an 80386/16 with about 8 meg of RAM. I
still had Windows but almost immediately started using Linux instead.
My boss came up behind me and wanted to know where the hell I got the
SUN (The SLS Window manager I chose was OpenLook Virtual Window
Manager). I pointed to the 80386 sitting under my desk, and showed
him some of the things I could do (using Linux, HP_UX, AND Solaris
access) and he was quite impressed. He had a great deal invested in
Microsoft Stock (which whe boasted about) and started asking Microsoft
some questions about Linux. Within a few days, Microsoft was offering
to make Dow Jones a "Preferred Partner" on a secret NT Server project.
Microsoft was going to compete with AOL and Prodigy by using
something like Lotus Notes to exchange forms, email, and news content.
The entire thing would be controlled using Windows NT servers.
Very quickly it was clear that all of the development resources,
except me (I was working on and managing about 25 project at the time,
including about 15 projects to distribute Dow Jones news feeds via
TCP/IP). There was a great deal of haggling over the contract, which
was extremely one-sided in Microsoft's favor. The legal team was
telling us that we absolutely should not sign the contract. I was
eventually shown the contract and I understood why. I wasn't allowed
to make a copy of the contract, but the terms where quite memorable.
Things like "The Parnter MUST provide .... by this date" and
"Microsoft will make an effort to provide ... at an appropriate time".
We had windows programming experience, and we even had Microsoft
consultants working with us, but even the best of estimates were WAY
OFF. Still, the team worked insane hours and even though we were 300%
late and 500% over budget, we managed to make the date required to
have our offering included in the NT Beta disk. When the disk finally
came out, we found out that several others were on that disk as well.
Meanwhile back at the ranch, I had coupled up with WAIS Inc, Brewster
Kahle and company. They had a search engine I'd tested on the Linux
distribution, and they suggested that we take a look at Mosaic and the
NCSA http server. I did a little looking, and sure enough, Mosaic 1.x
was on my Linux distribution (by then I was running some version of
Slackware). I did a quick proof of concept test, using the Dow Jones
feed handler for UNIX, the WAIS search engine, and the ncsa httpd
server. It took about a week to throw together, and it worked. I
wanted to make sure there wouldn't be any licensing problems, so I
asked if they would contact my product manager. They called the next
day, and we flew them out to talk to us. In about another month, we
had our first web server, running in California at WAIS headquarters.
They had hired a little company called Verity to help them with the
news feed (they were in the next suite of the same building in Menlo
Park). Before long, we were getting hits, lots of them. Every time
Brewster would be interviewed about the web, he would give out our URL
and traffic would triple, sometimes for weeks, until the next
appearance. Eventually we were getting so much traffic that we had to
upgrade from our Sparc/20 server to some really big muscle.
Through some cross-licensing agreements, Verity ended up with it's own
search engine, AOL purchased WAIS, and Dow Jones had a model for
feeding content through portals, to any site willing to pay the
royalties for the content (which were actually quite reasonable).
> > Microsoft tried to convince OEMs, Corporate IT
> > Managers, and the press, that Windows NT was going to ship any day.
>
> NT shipped about 2 months after Linux 1.0 shipped.
Isn't that interesting? :-D
Keep in mind that SLS and Slackware were shipping .95 and .97?
Linus was always very very cautious about calling anything "Done".
I've often found that very frustrating from a marketing perspective.
> > By the time Windows NT finally did ship, Linux was already available
> > on a single CD-ROM along with nearly all of the Open Source software
> > previously available for UNIX. Many of those companies who had software
> > available for UNIX Workstations, such as the Applix Office Suite, and
> > the FrameMaker multimedia editor, were already porting to Linux.
>
> Applix didn't show up on Linux until 1996, and FrameMaker didn't show up on
> Linux until after that.
I do remember that Linux had the Andrew EZ editor, which was a WYSIWYG
editor that could do spreadsheets, graphics and word processing, all
in one integrated program. There was also xfig which was an
interactive WYSWYG editor that saved it's content in industry standard
postscript format. You could take the postscript document and
compress it using Linux' compress. Not quite PDF, but very close.
There were many other programs. It seemed like almost too many.
There must have been over 500 packages, including editors, games,
clients, servers, it was like having an entire CompUSA (whatever it
was called in those days) right at your fingertips. Sure, the
postscript was a little slow if you were using an 80386/16 with no
floating point, and when you tried to use too many applications at
one, you paged the 8 meg to the hard drive almost constantly, but it
could go days without crashing (back when Windows 3.1 was crashing
every few hours). Even then, it was usually an X11 crash, so you
didn't have to reboot the whole computer unless you wanted to.
> > Plug-and-play - Shortly after the release of Windows NT 3.x, Linux came
> > out with "plug-and-play" capabilities. This created a real problem for
> > Microsoft because it was suddenly easier to install Linux than it was to
> > install Windows 3.11 or Windows NT 3.x.
>
> You have got to be kidding me. "Linux" and "easy to install" were never
> used in the same sentance unless there was a "not" in between them.
> Further, NT was released in mid 1993, Linux didn't get it's first
> plug-n-play support until the fall of 1994 with the release of Yggdrasil.
I was thinking more along the lines of the release of Windows NT 3.5,
which was really the first relatively stable release. Windows NT 3.1
was not exactly stable. It wasn't even as stable as Windows 3.1 which
isn't saying much.
http://windows.about.com/library/history/blhistory1993.htm
<quote>
August: Windows NT 3.1 - the first version of NT - is released. Lines
of code: 6 million.
October: Service Pack 1 for Windows NT 3.1 released.
December: Windows 3.11 and Windows for Workgroups 3.11 relea
</quote>
http://www.computerhope.com/history/windows.htm
<quote>
Microsoft Windows NT 3.5 was released September, 1994.
Microsoft Windows NT 3.51 was released June, 1995.
</quote>
I've addressed this in another post. Microsoft did not have plug and
play untile Windows95.
<quote>
Microsoft Windows 95 was released August, 1995 and sells more than 1
Million copies within 4 days.
</quote>
Keep in mind that these "sales" were units sold to OEMs, Retailers,
and Corporate customers. The sales had to be "booked" to show up in
the 1995 fiscal year or Microsoft's financial statement would have
been a disaster. Most of those first million weren't actually in the
hands of end users for several weeks.
> > Microsoft not only had to have
> > plug-and-play, but they needed to make sure that their implementation
> > made it harder to install Linux than to install Windows. They held up
> > Windows 95 for nearly a year, waiting until all of the OEMs and hardware
> > vendors signed agreements promising not to provide information useful
> > to Linux developers. Since Microsoft controlled the translations from
> > the Vendor ID and Device ID code to the driver and/or chipset, Linux
> > was hindered. This was probably illegal, but Red Hat didn't have the
> > big lawyers required to attack Microsoft or the OEMs head-on. The break
> > came when Adaptec, who had been promised that all Windows 95 machines
> > would run SCSI only, found out that Microsoft had merely included the
> > IDE drivers as one of the "SCSI" adapters. When Microsoft said, yes we
> > violated our agreement- what are you going to do about it? - Adaptec
> > gave the entire PCI device translation table to Red Hat, giving them
> > the ability to configure Plug-and-play devices using Microsoft's codes.
>
> IDE was always seperate from SCSI, and MS never released any IDE drivers as
> SCSI. Some third party hardware vendors released their IDE drivers as SCSI
> drivers, but MS never did.
I believe that the Windows 95 system has an icon labeled SCSI, within
that is the information about the IDE drives. This wasn't because
Microsoft was stupid, they were just playing a loophole that
backfired.
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/06-23-1998/0000690909&EDATE=
http://www.seul.org/docs/whylinux.html
<quote>
Some hardware vendors simply refuse to release the information on
their products necessary to write a driver. A recent (and fairly
public) example of this was Adaptec's response to Linux user
complaints about not making information on new versions of the
AHA-2940 BIOS available, meaning that the card behaves erratically
under Linux (and since such a card usually has the main system storage
hooked to it, that is not a Good Thing). Fortunately, Adaptec publicly
posted that it was willing to work with the Linux community for a
mutually beneficial solution. We can only hope episodes like this
become more common.
Meanwhile, some vendors are actually giving instructions on their tech
support pages on how to set their hardware up under Linux. A notable
example of this is Linksys, the network hardware vendor. This too is a
positive sign we can only hope will increase.
</quote>
http://www.open4success.org/usanet/index0137.html
One of mine -for reference.
http://www.opensource.ac.uk/mirrors/www.opensource.org/halloween/halloween2.html
<quote>
{ A Microsoft developer who wishes to remain anonymous comments:
MS really shoots themselves in the foot in driver space. For those of
us that will willingly spend effort to improve the quality,
functionality, and availability of device drivers for MS OSs, the
tools, etc. they provide are actually getting progressively worse.
This is happening largely because MS fails to grasp the basic concepts
you've been talking about. In response to driver quality and
availability issues, they've consistently made exactly the wrong
decisions: rather than encouraging more people to help and providing
better tools, they try to make the system more and more closed and
dumb down the tools.
A significant side effect of this is the killing of innovation - MS,
being a monolithic organization, can really only concentrate on a few
initiatives at a time, and improving device (printers, video, input,
disk, ...) functinality and performance is rarely very high on the
list. This is a great example of where they should let someone else
(either a partner or an industry standards body - or maybe even an
open-source community!) `homestead' a driver space. Instead they
intentionally make it more difficult for these 3rd parties to
contribute. The reasonably plausible reason MS gives for this is to
improve system stability - they blame a lot of NT robustness issues on
``bad 3rd party drivers''. Instead of helping the 3rd parties build
better drivers (better tools, better tech support/documentation,
actually soliciting input from the 3rd parties, etc.), though, the MS
approach is to assert more control of the driver space by making more
of the system closed.
The ironic effect of this, though, is that the 3rd parties still have
the business need to innovate despite the MS restrictions, so they end
up frequently hacking around the closed parts of the MS solutions with
no documentation - and the overall system stability goes down, not up.
By making the system more closed, they are decreasing stability &
quality, slowing innovation, and losing the opportunity to take
advantage of 3rd parties willing to contribute for free. The desire by
MS to own and control the interfaces is so strong, though, that they
can't step back far enough to understand what they are doing.
}
Recently, a small number of hardware vendors have begun to provide
Linux drivers for their NICs (3Com) and SCSI adapters (Adaptec). These
drivers are believed to be protected by the Library-GPL and are
consequently not open source (the Library-GPL is described later). It
remains to be seen whether this will create the momentum to develop
more commercial drivers for Linux.
</quote>
Gee - this is really fun, looking up obscure articles on 8 different
search sites, subscriber only sites,... and trying to remember the
exact day of the exact year that something happens. It takes about 4
hours/page.
I've replied to about 20 of these issues, and I'm still trying to deal
with stuff that happened 10 years ago.
That puts me at about 8 hours for the day. Since this isn't my job, I
don't think it's necessary to continue this excercise. If someone
wants to pay the standard hourly rate ($200/hour) I'd be willing to do
another $2000 worth of work in my almost nonexistent free time.
Hamilcar Barca
-0600), GreyCloud wrote:
> Erik Funkenbusch wrote:
>>
>> I was referring to the Windows 3.1 stack, not the NT stack.
>
> What win3.1 stack? It didn't have one. I had to get winsock just to
> get on the internet.
What a pain that was. I actually used a floppy from my collection of AOL
freebies to create an AOL account just so I could download a TCP/IP stack.
After hours of trying to get that to work, I discovered my ISP required
PAP and I had to go back to AOL to download another. (Then, after I
cancelled my free account, I had a hard time convincing AOL to stop
calling me to get a pay-by-the-hour account -- but that's not really
Microsoft's fault.)
> And that I had to pay for.
I was lucky. I discovered how to do TCP/IP under OS/2 before my license
expired.
Hamilcar Barca
2004 16:00:55 -0700), Rex Ballard wrote:
> Note - Datona was ?? WFW?, Chicago was Windows 95, and Cairo was NT4
No. Cairo development was a disaster, the operating system was summarily
canceled.
GreyCloud
Sean wrote:
> On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 13:56:50 -0600, GreyCloud wrote:
>
>
>
>>Could very well be. Of course I've never given any thought to Rex being
>>the straight guy for Eric to knock down. Sort of a two-man strawmans
>>argument troll technique. But I've noticed that Sean doesn't notice
>>this. And where are his supporting arguments for Linux here?
>
>
> Well in all honesty I didn't look that much into it, but like I said I
> didn't write that post. However after reading the post fully I do find it
> quite boring.As for my supporting arguments for Linux I prefer to address
> each interesting post on it's own merits. I am using Linux, so what? Just
> because Linux works for me, and has for quite a while, doesn't mean that
> it will work for everyone.
> The problem with this group is that people assume way too much and the
> minute something doesn't work correctly they seem to accuse the person of
> lying.
> For example you accuse me of lying when your link didn't work for me, and
> didn't work for other people as well. Why do you find the need to make
> such accusations?
I always test a link out when someone posting says it doesn't work.
If it works well I just posted that it worked ok for me.
Well, you came back pretty hot under the collar there for whatever
reasons you had.
> Personally had I posted a link that worked for some and
> not for others I would take it as that without attempting to find some
> sinister hidden agenda.
> As for Rex and Erik I haven't read their messages enough to form an
> opinion one way or the other except to see that both seem to stir the pot
> quite a bit when they post.
I've followed for a few years. Rex always seems to get under Erics skin
for some reason. But like Bo pointed out that they maybe just a tag
team... something I didn't think about before. Of course Eric also puts
his own spin on things, but he always defends M$ to the last tooth and nail.
Jesse F. Hughes
> I'm just looking forward to the day when they 'innovate' Usenet. Like
> they reinvented IRC as 'instant messaging'. The 'market leader in
> instant messaging' as a recent BBC news report put it.
>
> No doubt they will then reinvent the protocols and sell them back to
> us ..
I'm not saying I welcome Microsoft's innovations applied to Usenet.
But this concern has nothing to do with what iAn wrote. He said:
,----
| A few years ago, there was an actual article that described
| Microsoft's strategy to monitor NG's to track Linux information.
`----
That is simply bullshit as far as I know. You haven't provided any
evidence to the contrary.
--
"But remember, as long as one human being follows the rules of
mathematics, then mathematics as a human discipline survives.
Right now I'm that one human being, so mathematics survives."
-- James S. Harris
Erik Funkenbusch
> Erik Funkenbusch <er...@despam-funkenbusch.com> wrote in message news:<65gvvdn9...@funkenbusch.com>...
>> On 26 Aug 2004 18:39:16 -0700, Rex Ballard wrote:
>>
>>> Baruch <baru...@N0sbcglobal.net$PAM> wrote in message news:<UubXc.7473$FV3....@newssvr17.news.prodigy.com>...
>>>> ziliath wrote:
>>>
>>
>> Funny, but google doesn't seem to reflect any of this. Of course, this
>> isn't the first time you've made a bunch of bogus statements about what
>> happened on usenet in the past, only to find there is no evidence of it.
>> Further, Microsoft likely didn't even know what Linux was in 1995.
>
> As we've discussed before, Google's capabilities are limited.
Yet strangely, they *NEVER* have any have any of the articles you talk
about. One would think that the law of averages would suggest there would
be some. At least one. Oh wait, maybe someone has systematically gone
through Googles archives and deleted all the things you remember, even
before you express remembering them.
> When I looked up "Microsoft Hires Linux" I got 44,000 references.
>
> http://www.disinfopedia.org/wiki.phtml?title=Microsoft was one of
> them.
Uhh.. what exactly does this link have to do with your claims about this
"mysterious" Roger@? What does it have to do with your claims that COLA is
the source of all of MS's inspiration?
> 1995 was nearly 3400 days ago. Even if I read only a minumum of 10
> articles/day, that would be 34,000 articles. Most news sites don't
> keep archives older than a few years, it's pretty hard to find the
> original content online. Since archiving a copy and republishing it
> would be an illegal copyright violation, it's a bit hard to find it
> that way either.
The quote above was in reference to your comments about "Roger@", not any
news sites. You seem to be trying to deflect things here.
> If you really want to find the articles, go back to Byte Magazine from
> 1993 to 1995, you'll probably have to search the print versions or
> microfilm versions.
What articles are you referring to? Why would newsgroup articles be
published in Byte?
> Google's newsgroup archives prior to about 1995 are very limited.
> Storage was very expensive in the 1980s, and even back-up tapes were
> about $20/megabyte.
Since we're talking about 1995, not prior, what is your excuse? And why is
it that google only seems to be "limited" when it comes to things you
remember? Are you still claiming to have invented Viola? Lynx? Cookies?
SSL? SHTTP? htaccess?
> Many of the really intense newsgroups were streaming over
> 1/meg/group/day, which meant storing as much as 400 meg/group/year.
> In 1994, CD-R recorders were available, but they cost nearly 2 week's
> pay for the average programmer. Still, some people were able to
> archive content using this media.
Oh come off it. Newsgroups were archived on reel tape, and using even
simple compression were compressed to very manageable sizes. 400 meg of
usenet takes up about 10mb of space compressed. That can fit on a set of
floppies easily, much less tape.
> I still have some QIC-150 tapes as well as 2 reel-to-reel tapes,
> containing comp.os.unix and net.legal archives from the mid 1980s.
> Anyone know where I can get these transferred to CD-ROM?
You work for IBM. You're telling me there are no tape drives laying
around?
> On my web site, I have archives from two mailing lists, one being the
> online-news mailing list, which was for anyone wishing to publish
> content on the newly commercialized internet. The other was
> online-newspapers which was for anyone who was already a publisher of
> print media, and wanted to offer content, for profit, on the internet.
> Even this archive tops 100 megabytes, and got very expensive to keep
> on a hosted system.
Of course you could have easily used a compressed filesystem, or even
written a small amount of script to extract said articles from a gzip
archive. Now why didn't you think of that? But funny how you're
distracting from the actual point. What does any of this have to do with
your proving your assertions?
> This archive can now be found at:
> http://www.open4success.org/Olnews/index.html
> It looks like I need to go back and clean up the access permissions.
>
> You will find many references to the topics mentioned above, which
> makes it easier to pin down specific dates. I've notices from my
> htlog that many lawyers have been visiting the site. Some have told
> me that this was for the purpose of patent nullification, proving
> prior art.
Is there a reason for this tangent?
> By 1992, my personal library filled a large room, 6 full size
> bookshelves, filled with magazines and trade journals. By 1995, my
> storage garage was 10'x10'k10' and packed to the gills, mostly with
> boxes full of books and magazines. After paying $100/month for almost
> 12 years, I finally junked all of it. Anyone know where I can
> purchase the CD-ROM's or DVDs containing the first 30 years of Byte,
> InfoWorld, InformationWeek, ComputerWeek, and the other 20
> publications I read every week? In case you missed it, that's nearly
> 3000 periodicals, most of which I have read pretty much
> cover-to-cover.
I too have read most of those, though I stopped reading the trade rags
about 8 years ago when internet publishing became much more cost effective.
But again, what's your point?
> If you can give me the site or DVD containing that content, perhaps
> I'll go through and document some of the comments stated above.
Ah.. I get it now. So what you're saying is that you have no evidence to
support anything you've said, and coincidently, there is no other reference
to any of these major events other than a single story buried somewhere in
a huge archive of offline media.
Right.
> And by the way, they must be EXACTLY as they were published. One
> problem I've had with online content lately is that reporting and
> articles an cases which are subsequently sealed by the courts seem to
> disappear along with the court record. It reminds me of Farenheight
> 451, that really old book where a "fireman" burns books so that
> people's only access to information is the easily manipulated
> electronic media.
The interesting thing about the internet is that stuff is often mirrored
elsewhere. If something is truly important, it's likely to get copied.
Any of the stories you refer to would at the VERY LEAST have some reference
to it, even if it didn't contain the actual content, it would refer to it.
Even that's is not the case with your stories.
Oh wait, now someone is systematically going through not just google, but
everyone elses sites and deleting anything you remember.
Nice trick.
Erik Funkenbusch
> Error BR-549: MS DRM 1.0 rejects the following post from Erik Funkenbusch:
>
>>> Standard Deviation - COLA discussions frequently include the advantages
>>> of certain standards such as TCP/IP, HTTP, IRC, LDAP, or XML.
>>> Microsoft routinely attempts "embrace and extend" these standards.
>>
>> Funny, considering that MS *CREATED* XML, and the W3C adopted it.
>>
>>> Keep in mind that these standards are the product of many organizations
>>> working together to create a common baseline which can be used between
>>> any of those who adhere to the standard.
>>
>> Now, considering that MS ahs not extended either TCP/IP, HTTP, IRC or LDAP
>> in any way that wasn't completely standard, and that they themselves
>> created XML, how can you make these claims?
>
> You've lost all credibility, Erik. XML was developed by W3C, not adopted by
> them. It is derived from SGML.
I stand corrected on this. I recalled having read that XML was primarily
created by Microsoft, and that they were the driving force for adoption of
the standard by the W3C. I've read many articles that state that Jean
Paoli, a MS employee was one of the major contributors to the standard. He
was also a major player in SGML as well, though for another company.
For example, this article refers to him as a "co-creator" of XML.
http://www.atnewyork.com/news/article.php/2193151
Here's another one, which is admitedly from MS.
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2002/Nov02/11-14XMLConference02PR.asp
And another:
"Jean is a co-editor of the XML standard and co-created with Jon Bosak (and
others) the W3C XML working group in July 1996."
> Maybe you believe what you say. My feeling, however, is that you will say
> anything, no matter how untrue, to win an argment.
My understanding is that MS was one of the driving forces of the creation
and adoption of XML by the W3C. While that certainly makes them a creator
of XML, it doesn't make them the sole creator, which was not my intention
to imply.
The point was, MS was involved in the creation of XML, and to my knowledge,
they have never "extended" it in some way incompatible with the standard.
Erik Funkenbusch
> Error BR-549: MS DRM 1.0 rejects the following post from Magnus Henriksson:
>
>> "Erik Funkenbusch" <er...@despam-funkenbusch.com> wrote in message
>>>
>>> Funny, considering that MS *CREATED* XML, and the W3C adopted it.
>>
>> I cannot say anything about the other standards, but the idea that Microsoft
>> invented XML probably comes from an article by David Ignatius in Washington
>> Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19908-2000May6.html).
>
> That URL includes the following CORRECTION:
>
> "Correction to This Article
> The computer language known as XML was developed by an industrywide group
> known as the World Wide Web consortium, not by two Microsoft technologists,
> as stated in David Ignatius's May 7 column. The technologists contributed to
> the effort, but did not invent the language."
The funny part is that this correction was made at Microsoft's request.
http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/200005/msg00182.html
>> This was discussed on the xml-dev mailing list
>> (http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/200005/msg00132.html).
>
> "The troubling part is that, if Microsoft actually believes it invented this
> technology, that implies that they regard it as something they can change in
> spite of the commitments of the rest of us. (We, after all, share no claim
> to it.) If this standard is corrupted (and I'm not so concerned about
> the wars over schemas, as long as the syntax and low-level data
> models/APIs stay cross-platform and application-independent), the
> evolution of the Internet as an open medium will be set back
> indefinitely, and Microsoft will have missed the chance of a
> lifetime--denying it to the rest of us while doing so. They can
> corrupt the standard simply by assuring that "XML" means different
> things to different developers, nullifying the W3C specification that
> describes it and trademarks the name."
Erik Funkenbusch
> Erik Funkenbusch wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 14:28:21 GMT, Paul Pygeon wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Le 27 Août 2004 05:01 Erik Funkenbusch a écrit en cette journée dans
>>>comp.os.linux.advocacy:
>>>
>>>
>>>>Wow, MS created a TCP/IP stack in response to messages on COLA. That's
>>>>amazing, considering MS released it's first TCP/IP stack in 1992, and COLA
>>>>wasan't even created until December 19, 1994.
>>>
>>>MS don't create a TCP/IP stack. They pick up the BSD TCP/IP stack and create
>>>their own some years later.
>>>
>>>http://www.kuro5hin.org/?op=displaystory;sid=2001/6/19/05641/7357
>>
>>
>> I was referring to the Windows 3.1 stack, not the NT stack.
>
> What win3.1 stack? It didn't have one. I had to get winsock just to
> get on the internet. And that I had to pay for.
MS released an add-on TCP/IP stack for Windows 3.1
Sinister Midget
> Daeron <dae...@demon.com> writes:
>
>> I'm just looking forward to the day when they 'innovate' Usenet. Like
>> they reinvented IRC as 'instant messaging'. The 'market leader in
>> instant messaging' as a recent BBC news report put it.
>>
>> No doubt they will then reinvent the protocols and sell them back to
>> us ..
>
> I'm not saying I welcome Microsoft's innovations applied to Usenet.
> But this concern has nothing to do with what iAn wrote. He said:
>
> ,----
>| A few years ago, there was an actual article that described
>| Microsoft's strategy to monitor NG's to track Linux information.
> `----
>
> That is simply bullshit as far as I know. You haven't provided any
> evidence to the contrary.
Make of this what you will.......
http://www.otwa.com/community/showthread.php?t=7834
http://news.com.com/2008-1082_3-5065298.html
--
Using Outlook Express is the moral equivalent of putting on spike
heels, fishnets, and a bustier, walking down to the corner of Virus St
and Trojan Ave, and shouting "Hello, Sailor!".
Roy Culley
Erik Funkenbusch <er...@despam-funkenbusch.com> writes:
>
> The point was, MS was involved in the creation of XML,
The point was you were wrong. Going by your past posting history
deliberately so. The Funkenbusch shuffle is just a waste of time.
As Linųnut said you have zero credibility.
> and to my knowledge, they have never "extended" it in some way
> incompatible with the standard.
Because they don't need to. XML allows proprietory binary data. Remember
what they did to kerberos?
While we have your attention Funkenbusch would you care to answer the
questions regarding TT fonts and the NTFS journal location? You have
been asked over and over again yet refuse to answer?
Peter Köhlmann
Care to mention how long after lots of people had aquired Trumpets Winsock?
You know, MS already at those times had delivery times easily rivalling
Longhorn BSE and Shorthorn MCD
--
To start your shiny new Pentium IV in Gameboy mode just enter
C:\win
kier
> kier wrote:
>> On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 13:45:57 -0400, DFS wrote:
>>
>>> Bo Grimes wrote:
>>>
>>> <snip>
>>>
>>>
>>>> Rex has no more documentation and evidence for what he writes than
>>>> DFS does.
>>>
>>> Speaking of documentation, what evidence do you have that I don't
>>> have documentation and evidence for what I write?
>>
>> Where's your proof that you do?
>
> I'm serious. Bo claims I have little or no documentation for what I write.
> I want to know what he's talking about.
I can't speak for Bo, but you've consistently said how bad OSS software
is, with little or no proof provided.
>
>
>
>>>> How does it help advocacy to have DFS of all posters pointing out the
>>>> unsupported and undocumented claims Rex makes?
>>>
>>> You're forgetting the entire point of cola is not to advocate Linux
>>> (group description to the contrary), but to bash Windows in silly,
>>> lying, childish ways.
>>
>> Tell me why anyone should believe the above statement, just because you
>> say so.
>
> Recent thread titles:
>
> "MS pays moles to pretend to be Linux users" "ex-pee Stupid Pack 2
> borked on AMD 64-bit chips" "Leave it to MS to fuck up cron"
> "Longhorn gutted"
> "Choosing a Windows DB sucks!"
> "Flaws in SP2 security features"
> "Microsoft releases "crippleware""
> "Windows SP2 hosed my entire system"
> "windows: not just bad, but unbelievably bad" "Entire Factory Down
> Because of Microsoft ..."
>
> Except for the first, why are ANY of these threads posted to cola?
> Answer: cola nuts are silly, childish, MS-hating liars. Boys is what
> they are, actually.
Give me a break! I'm certainly no boy, and nor are the vast majority here.
And you still have to prove that what's post here about MS is invariably
untrue. You'd hardly expect users in in a *linux* group to be singing
the praises of MS, would you? Oh, sorry, yes, you do.
Try slamming idiots like Peter Bilt for a change. Or K-Man, who pollutes
everything he touches.
>
>
>> What credibility do you have here? None.
>
> Like anyone here has any credibility. It's a flame Windows group.
You say so. Others say different. And what should it matter to you if we
do flame Windows? If you don't care for it, don't read it, or leave. No
one forces you to remain here.
>
>> All you do is bash linux.
>
> I rarely bash Linux. I constantly bash _Linux morons_. There's a
> difference.
Not much. And you have, frequently, bashed linux. And once again, for the
hard of thinking - i.e, you - there are no 'linux morons' here. Repeating
that crap will not make it come true.
--
Kier
Erik Funkenbusch
> "DFS" <nos...@nospam.com> wrote in message news:<10ithal...@corp.supernews.com>...
>> Other than your self-professed claims, do you have any evidence whatsoever
>> for:
>>
>> "They held up Windows 95 for nearly a year,
>
> That's easy:
We know Windows 95 was held up for a year, it was not held up for a year
for the reasons you claimed, though. The fact that you edited his comment
to suit your needs is quite deceptive. The article you point to does
nothing to support your claim that Windows 95 was held up for a year,
waiting until all of the OEMs and hardware vendors signed agreements
promising not to provide information useful to Linux developers.
> http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0SMG/is_n9_v14/ai_16253778
> <b><quote>
> Long a powerful industry influence, Microsoft Corp. will gain renewed
> attention as its future operating systems come into view. The Redmond,
> Wash., giant's fortunes will likely rise or fall based on the
> reception of its next Windows systems -- widely known by its code
> name, Chicago -- as well as Daytona and Cairo, the next versions of
> Windows NT. Reports indicate that the formal introduction of Daytona
> is imminent, that Chicago should emerge at the beginning of 1995, and
> that a full-fledged Cairo is more likely to appear in 1996.
> </quote></b>
> Note - Datona was ?? WFW?, Chicago was Windows 95, and Cairo was NT4
Dayton was NT 3.5. Chicago Windows 95, and Cairo was initially to be NT4,
but NT4 was renamed and Cairo became a set of technologies, kind of like
"Pink" from Apple/IBM.
> Later in same article:
> <quote>
> Instability is one of the problems that Microsoft will address with
> Chicago, which will provide better protection against programs
> colliding into each other. "Chicago is the ultimate client operating
> system," said Richard Freedman, Microsoft's product manager, Chicago
> Group. "It connects very well in heterogeneous environments and
> different networks, and has very good support for being managed." Most
> importantly, with Chicago, there is no DOS hiding under Windows.
> </quote>
Still doesn't support your argument.
> <quote>
> Highlights:
> MICROSOFT: THE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME
> CHICAGO
> * New user interface
> * Supports Win32 API
> * Does not require MS-DOS
> * Preemptive multitasking, multithreads for 32-bit programs
> Due: Early 1995
> </quote>
Still not supporting your claim that it was held up for non-disclosure
agreements.
So what? MS was showing betas of Plug-n-play for a year before that. And
plug-n-play was largely in the BIOS.
To claim that MS copied Yggdrasil is ludicrious. MS created the
Plug-N-Play specification with Intel, how could MS copy something they
helped create? Especially considering that Yggdrasil's implementation was
essentially beta as well as the article you reference below indicates.
> http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=2755
> Posted on Friday, April 01, 1994 by LJ Staff
> <quote>
> Yggdrasil
> Available only on CD-ROM, this is a very popular distribution. Current
> and complete, it offers a quick way to get a working system up and
> running. It includes X-windows (in fact, it requires you to load X to
> do system configuration) and a pretty amazing set of tools. Like most
> of the up-to-date distributions, it has a few bugs. It is, however, a
> great choice for someone who wants to get a working Linux system with
> X up and running quickly. I also feel it is well worth the $50 for the
> amount of source code you get in a compact form. We have one Linux
> system in the office running Yggdrasil.
> </quote>
> I don't recall if Yggdrasil was using the term "Plug 'N Play" at this
> point, but from the description it's clear that that was their goal
> from the very beginning.
Of course, it was merely Linux supporting the hardware specification.
And again, what does this have to do with MS holding up the release of
Windows 95 to get non-disclosures from OEM's?
>> waiting until all of the OEMs
>> and hardware vendors signed agreements promising not to provide information
>> useful to Linux developers." re: Plug-n-Play.
>
> As we know, getting a copy of any contract signed by Microsoft
> requires a court order
> due to the NDA clauses. And getting that court order requires that
> you have probable
> cause to believe that Microsoft is using the NDA to obstruct justice.
So you just assume the contract exists, despite never having seen it.
> Micrcosoft used their NDAs against the Attorney General of the United
> States,
> (actually the AGs of 4 administrations Reagan, Bush I, Clinton, and
> Bush II.)
> Do you think they would publish such a contract via the WEB?
>
> I got word of it via e-mail. I wish I could find it.
Now it becomes abundently clear. You believe everything you read if
someone sends you an email about it.
> Do you really think it's all coincidence?
What is all coincidence?
>> "Microsoft...also had the BIOS restrict the SIZE of an IDE drive to prevent
>> the replacement with a drive which could hold both the Windows and Linux
>> partitions." re: single partition
>
> Keep in mind that SCSI devices could theoretically support 2 terabytes
> (2^32 * 1024).
>
> Microsoft's BIOS requirements for IDE limited drives to 63
> sectors/track and 16 heads.
No, that was IBM's specification for the BIOS.
> It also had a limit of 16383 cylinders, which meant a maximum size of
> 8 gigabytes.
> The systems sold with Windows 95 had limits of around 200 Megabytes,
> and early Pentiums had limits of about 500 megabytes.
> All machines were shipped with a single partition.
The first limit was 500 MB, and this was simply because the IDE
specification was designed to conform to the old MFM and RLL controllers.
The format used a 24 bit address (32 bit if you count Drive selector),
using 10 bits for cylinder (allowing up to 1024 cylinders), 8 bits for head
(256 heads) and 6 bits for the cylinder. This was because, at the time,
IBM drives typically had more heads than sectors/cylinder because of the
density of the magnetic substrate used on the disks.
A new format (LBA) was created for IDE drives which used 16 bits for
cylinders (65536), 4 bits for heads (16) and 8 bits for sectors (256), and
of course 4 bits for drive selector (allowing up to 16 disks), though drive
selector was not typically used this way.
Now, there were two major problems with these two standards. The first was
that most older BIOS's only allocated 12 bits for cylinder (10 wasn't
apparently a good multiple). This was a holdover from the old MFM days as
well. This limited cylinder size to 4096 bits, and was what created the
2.1GB limit. This, in conjunction with an oddity in the BIOS Int 13 calls
created the 528MB limit. This was because the Int 13 calls used only 10
bits of addressing and placed the low 8 bits of the cylinder address in CH
and used bits 6 and 7 of CL to hold the high order bits, while the bottom 6
bits held the cylinder count, leaving DH to hold head ahd DL to hold drive
number.
This was compliant with the CHS specification. The problem was that heads
in IDE drives were limited to 16, which created the artificial limit of
528MB. That meant that any program that used the BIOS to access the disk
was limited to 528MB, such as DOS and early versions of Windows. It also
meant that the BIOS could only "see" the first 528MB for it to find a
bootable partition. This is how "translation" software worked, by using
the extra heads storage to address more space.
"Extended" BIOS's with LBA allowed for the much richer specification, but
was still limited to 2.1GB because the CMOS RAM was limited to 12 bits for
cylinder count.
None of this was created by MS as you claimed, much less artificially so to
limit Linux (which didn't even exist, and wouldn't for more than 10 years,
when this specification was created), though Dos and Window certainly
exacerbated the problem because of it's reliance on BIOS access. This
became a reactive game in which OEM's would create workarounds and MS would
adapt to support the new standards.
> http://www.hk8.org/old_web/linux/run/ch02_02.htm
> <quote>
> People who want to switch back and forth between different operating
> systems sometimes wonder which to install first: Linux or the other
> system? We can testify that some people have had trouble installing
> Windows 95 after Linux. Windows 95 tends to wipe out existing boot
> information when it's installed, so you're safer installing it first
> and then installing Linux afterward using the information in this
> chapter.
> <quote>
It should be noted that OS/2 would also wipe out a Linux boot record, and a
Windows one for that matter, though it would automatically configure a
chain boot for Windows (though not Linux).
This was simply common practice by OS manufacturers, not just MS.
So, you're going to charge me for correcting your own incompetence? Yes, I
guess you do work for IBM.
Erik Funkenbusch
> Daeron <dae...@demon.com> writes:
>
>> Jesse F. Hughes wrote:
>>
>>> iAn <i...@no.spam.me> writes:
>>
>>>> ziliath wrote:
>>
>> <snip>
>>
>>>> A few years ago, there was an actual article that described
>>>> Microsoft's strategy to monitor NG's to track Linux information.
>>
>>> Cite?
>>
>>> Specifically about monitoring newsgroups in order to track Linux
>>> information.
>>
>> http://netscan.research.microsoft.com/
>>
>
> Specifically about monitoring newsgroups ***in order to track Linux
> information***.
>
> Netscan's purpose is not to track Linux information per se.
I believe MS created Netscan, in part, to manage their MVP program, which
rewards people that consistently help other users in technical forums.
Erik Funkenbusch
The Winsock specification was released in 1992. The earliest reference I
can find to a released product is June 1993.