Ubuntu, Macintosh and Windows XP 641
LXer has an interesting look at the big three operating systems with some surprising results. From the article: "If you think that a Linux advocate cannot make an objective analysis of desktop operating systems, then you need to read this report. You may find yourself surprised with some brutal honesty that leaves out the free software philosophy."
Article Text (Score:5, Informative)
Posted by tadelste on Mar 19, 2006 3:44 PM
Lxer.com; By Tom Adelstein
If you think that a Linux advocate cannot make an objective analysis of desktop operating systems, then you need to read this report. You may find yourself surprised with some brutal honesty that leaves out the free software philosophy.
All three desktop operating systems have admirable qualities. Each has some weaknesses. Attending a recent User Group Fair, I had another chance to see them at work. Having used and programmed on each platform provides some unbiased insights.
Background
I have owned several Macintosh computers. I had new world and old world bios machines including several older 6500s, 7600s, etc. that would not take OS X. I also had a blue and white, a beige workgroup server, Power Mac G4s, a Cube, iBook, etc. I remember making the transition from OS 9 to OS X. I liked it.
I used Microsoft from the DOS days to early Windows 2.0, 3.0, 3.11, Windows 95, 98, ME, NT3.51 - 4.0, 2000 and XP. I still have the licenses and media for everything since Windows 3.1. I managed large IBM networks with OS/2 on the desktop and LAN Server 3 as the server. I won't get into my NetWare experience.
I used Solaris, AIX and Linux starting with Slackware 3x. I even ran Red Hat on Sun IPCs, Sparc 5 and 10 workstations. I'm now using SUSE SLES and Pro, RHEL, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu for daily use on servers and workstations.
Each system has different programing architectures with OS X a little closer to Linux than Windows. OS X uses a UNIX architecture to run its internals. However, the OS X desktop interface does not resemble Linux or other UNICES which depend on X. You can use X on the Mac natively.
Windows has a completely different programing structure from OS X and Linux. Windows relies heavily on its user interface which has evolved over time. Programing involves using Windows shell extensions. XP uses the NT kernel to manage file systems, internals and communication with the graphical shell.
OS X and Linux use completely different schemes with kernel extensions and independent programs running inside the user interface shell. The UNIX shell runs independently in what kernel developers call userland.
UNIX and Linux programmers consider their programing methods preferable to Windows. Windows developers consider the interface extensions easier to use and providing for more rapid application development. Each have merit when you look at them objectively. Of course, Macintosh developers will say that since they moved to the UNIX method that they experience more stability.
Macintosh
I started with the first Mac configured as a desktop publishing machine. I remember liking it because it cut costs we otherwise spent on type setting and graphics, paste up
For personal use, I used the Mac for graphics, audio productions and developing web sites. OS X made a huge difference since I didn't have to reboot in the middle of working. I also knew my way around UNIX and that allowed me to use Internet applications I hadn't used previously.
I found the developers tools useful. I enjoyed the interface. I found myself exploring more of the system when I purchased "OS X, the Missing Manual". The same book helped me discover ways of using Windows and Linux I hadn't known previously.
Windows XP
I recall using XP for three months without having to reboot it. I don't remember that happening before. I started collecting Microsoft Certs when Windows 95 arrived. I had used Excel 5 and Access to develop financial tools. Later, I became a sysadmin and ran a couple of large NT networks.
XP appeared safe behind our firewall. After three months, my system became sluggish and prone to malware. I did maintenance on the system regularly including defraging the disk, deleting unnecessary files and checking the registry.
I liked XP better than any previ
Karma Whoring (Score:3, Informative)
Re:So Macintosh is to CHICKEN!!! (Score:2, Informative)
Mammal meat vs. other animal meat (Score:5, Informative)
Have you ever noticed that in the scheme of naming meat for the three big land animals is completely broke?
No, the system works as designed. For mammals, the English name of the animal comes from Anglo-Saxon, while the English name of its flesh prepared as food comes from French. See also sheep => mutton; deer => venison. But for species in other classes that extend Chordata, the English name of the prepared flesh is derived directly from the common English name of the animal: duck => duck; pheasant => pheasant; frog => frog legs; tuna => tuna.
Unavailable tax software??? (Score:5, Informative)
I did my taxes this year with Quicktax under WINE. To my surprise and delight, everything just worked. Kudos to the sidenet-wine-config [sidenet.ddo.jp] people -- this tool downloads and installs several key bits of software from Microsoft that many windows apps expect (such as IE).
Doesn't have a what?... (Score:5, Informative)
No... I'll simply say...
Distrowatch's Page Hit Ranking has Ubuntu #1 (Score:2, Informative)
Top 5 are:
1 Ubuntu 2711
2 SUSE 1827
3 Mandriva 1542
4 Fedora 1199
5 MEPIS 632
Jonathan
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"I really wish I hadn't recommended http://www.justgofaster.com/ [justgofaster.com] driver training to that Spanish twat" - Michael Schumacher
Re:XP is a Bad Development Platform? (Score:4, Informative)
First, I can't recall the last time I needed or wanted to redirect output to a file from a command line app while I was doing development. Perhaps it's because I do a different kind of development than you do, but regardless, I would hardly classify XP is a bad development platform over something like that. Even so, you're completely wrong as it's very easy to pipe output [microsoft.com] in XP.
Search through source file relies on 3rd party solutions, and few of them have the ability to work with regular expressions.
Huh? Aside from the fact that hitting F3 in Windows will bring up a find dialog that can search the contents of files, Visual Studio (and virtually every other IDE that runs on Windows) has the ability to search with regular expressions [microsoft.com].
Re:Far from "brutal" (Score:2, Informative)
Ever had to connect to a WPA enabled network? It is not usable at all. The wireless tools are mediocre at best; the NetworkManager service doesn't support wpa, and it appears like development is moving ahead at tutrtle's pace.
And stil, the menu editor seems to be read only (at least in FC). It's getting better, but no where close to mom and dad simplicity IMO.
I like Linux and Gnome a lot, but it has some serious usability hurdles to get past first.
Read his thread before judging (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Can I fill in? (Score:4, Informative)
besides those few things, i found it to be really easy to use and setup. i am not illiterate with computers, and i have used linux before, but i would still consider myself a linux newbie (although it was debian that i used previously, so i know my way around apt).
Re:XP is a Bad Development Platform? (Score:3, Informative)
Windows is a developer's nightmare. You point at the MS IDE, but it is not that good, and at the best possible light, it is still very small, lacking most of the tools that make a developer's life easier. Windows API is terrible and Windows lacks laguages. Despite the fact that you can always install some more compilers and interpreters, installing stuff at Windows is HARD, and well, you need to install them, on UNIXes they come by default. Windows also lacks shared libraries and toolkits.
And you'll always have the problem of using Windows user interface, with all those stupid confirmation dialogs, and extra keys presses, and only mouse programs, and the newer MS's commands moving through the monitor and vanishing when you don't use them.
Re:Can I fill in? (Score:3, Informative)
I've always had a problem with people complaining about the possibility of lilo or grub messing up any existing bootable OS's if something goes wrong. Yes it is a minor pain to go in and fix the boot loader so you can once again boot into all of your OS's. But the thing most people miss is that if you try to install Windows as a dual boot with another operating system it doesn't even *try* to play nice. It just overwrites the mbr and goes along its merry way without giving you even a clue as to what it is doing. [I'm not sure what OS/X would do]. That is supposed to be better? Why aren't people complaining about that? Linux was well established in the world by the time WinXP came out. Microsoft has no excuse for not supporting a dual boot.
Any comparison/review between the big 3 OS's needs to be based on the same usage patterns [ie. All of them from a blank machine through install to a single OS, or all of them and their support for dual-booting etc.]
Re:Far from "brutal" (Score:3, Informative)
With Ubuntu? Yep. No problems. WPA-PSK TKIP and WPA2-PSK (AES). In fact, there is more than one step-by-step guide on how to get wpa-supplicant up and running on the Ubuntu Forums. The hardest part is cutting and pasting the shell commands.
WPA works fine on the other distros I've used including the latest Open Suse and FC4.
Re:OT- Re:Read his thread before judging (Score:5, Informative)
The way he linked to evidence of his own jerkishness as if he thought it defended him, I think the guy really might honestly need therapy.
Re:Or the internet (Score:5, Informative)
>companies are making their software
>available as web packages, which OS
>you are using becomes moot.
Yup.
Even if that weren't the case, judging a computer system by whether or not you can perform a task that one needs to perform roughly one hour per year is just silly. The author mentions a dozen application that are used daily, followed by the line, "and most importantly income tax preparation software." Most importantly? In what bizarro-universe is a home pc's most important feature tax prep software?
Even if there weren't several very robust online tax prep services, and if paper forms and human tax accountants weren't an option, it's hard to believe there are many potential linux users who don't have a friend or colleague who would lend them a windows machine once a year in order to do taxes. (Whether you're willing to give your SSN and banking info to a machine administered by someone other than you is another matter, I suppose.)
In passing, it's worth noting that of the other "missing" applications, only two that are genuine categories of software rather than specific vendor packages - PDF converters and legal DVD players - really have no place on the list.
There are plenty of ways of generating PDFs on linux. Having spent a fair amount of time generating PDFs from both platforms in recent years, I claim it's far easier to make arbitrary material into a high quality PDF using an unmodified linux install than it is in windows, even after paying hundreds of dollars to Adobe.
What's more, while there are no *legal* dvd players and there are a hand full of important codecs that are *legally* restricted in the US, it is trivial to install illegal software to satisfy one's every multimedia need. If linux growth were restricted only to those of us who claim it is ethically defensible to obtain an illicit copy of media playing software which is distributed for free to users of one OS but cannot be purchased at any price by users of another OS, in order to play our own legally purchased media on our own hardware, the linux community would never notice the difference.
Re:Mammal meat vs. other animal meat (Score:4, Informative)
Re:About the tax software (Score:2, Informative)
Having said that, I think that it is unconcionable for the government to require individuals to pay to file their taxes. Things are a bit better now that you can download fillable-in
Re:Can I fill in? (Score:5, Informative)
If you upgrade package a package that depends on some library "libfoo" that also has a newer version out, there's a chance that all of the other packages that use "libfoo" will need updated as well. This is because OSS tends to do a huge amount of software reuse. Windows and MacOS [X] software doesn't do that to the same extent.
The reason you can't just upgrade thet first package and not libfoo and all the others is that it will completely break things. Instability is what you'll get if you're extremely lucky, but it's far more likely that all those programs will crash as soon as you try to run them, because you're using an incompatible older library.
The good news, though, is that Ubuntu only makes minor security or stability upgrades within a release. You won't see a package go from version 1.5 to 2.0 within a given Ubuntu release, specifically because it's newer and less tested. If there's an upgrade available, you can rest assured that it's extremely unlikely to break anything -- these are minor, well-tested updates. If an upgrade is available, take it! You may be at risk if you don't. The updates you see are guaranteed not to be bleeding-edge.
(NB: This isn't true of all distributions, but it is true of Ubuntu.)
Re:Far from "brutal" (Score:4, Informative)
Yes, too often things are too difficult to do in Linux. Getting that same card to work in Ubuntu was a lot more difficult, and they had detailed instructions on how to get it to work (AFAIK, it should work now OOB with zero hassle). But many things ARE getting better, and many things that used to be very difficult and tedious to set up are actually very, very easy these days. In the end, the main reason why many things are difficult is because the hardware-manufacturers don't provide Linux-drivers, and we have to resort to hacked-together kludges. As it happens, that WLAN-card had vendor-supplied GPL'ed drivers, and getting it to work was as easy as plugging the card in. Took about 5 seconds in total.
Re:apps (Score:3, Informative)
I believe you are thinking of IOKit [apple.com] when you say "Quartz is used to sync the microkernel (Mach derivative) with the BSD Compatibility Layer (freeBSD derived) to create an established and elegant interface to the kernel services, etc.".
You should review... Mac OS X System Architecture [apple.com]