Linux Ubuntu

[JustinStacey.x]

It only turns into a flame war when fanbois like you come along and offer statements which hold no weight at all and that you just can't back up. I've backed up my points; now where's yours?

I also offered to continue this via PM, but instead you request the thread be locked because you have nothing to counter my argument but at the same time are too arrogant to admit when you're wrong. (And also, that you've conducted an argument you cannot uphold).

 

[generalvegitable]

I and everyone who has used ubuntu has reasons why it is better than windows, its just I would rather be banned for stopping a flame war than being in one

 

[matt]

I think both of you need to take a step back from the forum and cool off.

 

[SouthEastern-465]

And this thread was only about computer systems!

Anyway I dont care what any one thinks go with "Windows XP".

 

[generalvegitable]

I sort of agree with SouthEastern-465 in that windows xp is good, but only to an extent

 

[DaveNewcastle]

When I "retire" a machine from front-line use, I generally allocate it to another job where its performance is going to meet the requirements.

One of the consequences is that machines which are being retired while running Windoze are ALWAYS able to do a great job in a second life with a Linux OS.

Also worth noting - some of my Linux boxes have run continuously for years. I can't think of any of my Windows boxes that hasn't had to be re-strarted at least once a year, sometimes MUCH more frequently. (And thats with Win98, Win2k, Win2003, Win XP. Oddly there's an exception with aWin95 box which controls the warehouse heating and which hasn't needed a reboot for 6 or 7 years!).
But after having had dozens of machnes in the racks, its those running Linux that have kept going and most reliably.

But if it helps, although I have many ongoing issues with MS Windows, most of them are actually attributable to the commercial choice of software Co.s in the commercial market to be competitive rather than cooperative (as they tend to be in Linux world). eg incompatibility between MS hardware drivers and 3rd party cards, MS database drivers and 3rd party Querys, MS email clients and 3rd party anti-spam s/ware.

They both have their places - Windoze for users desktops (but why not use Open Office rather than MS Office), and Linux for servers.

 

[JustinStacey.x]

Open Office is horrible, in my opinion.

As for your Win95 uptime of 6/7 years, you should take a screenshot and upload it somewhere, you never know, you may even be holding a world record there.

 

[Old Timer]

I dont want this to become a flame war, or have the thread locked so please be cool headed.

A question. IF Linux is SO bad why is it that most Companies now use it, as do most these so called intelligent mobile phones.

I am also told that airline passengers watch films on screens powered by Linux, Google uses Linux, and 60% of web searches are achieved through Linux.

Linux is used by the most successful ISPs, most cloud computing farms, and most of the T500 super computers.

Excuse me for being somewhat confused by all these posts saying Linux is crap.

 

[JustinStacey.x]

I dont want this to become a flame war, or have the thread locked so please be cool headed.

A question. IF Linux is SO bad why is it that most Companies now use it, as do most these so called intelligent mobile phones.

:/ dude. I work for an IT firm, and we manage quite a number of clients. NONE use Linux. Not a breath of Linux anywhere. It's pure Windows out where we are, and for a lot of the frontend business world. Sure, some of the backend in large firms is done in *nix type systems, but that's about it.

As for 'intelligent mobile phones', as far as I know the leading ones at the moment are HTC which either run Google's Android OS or Windows Mobile. Also, Apple's iPhone is pretty damn smart. No sign of Linux here?(1)

I am also told that airline passengers watch films on screens powered by Linux, Google uses Linux, and 60% of web searches are achieved through Linux.

Yes, the one thing that Linux really does well is embedded applications and portable devices. This is because the Kernel, unlike the Windows Kernel, can be modified, configured and patched to suit the purpose. If you build your own Linux Kernel with exactly what you want, you can tailor it to certain uses. With Windows you just get what you are given regardless... and Windows embedded is a joke. While the monolithic kernel of Linux is also a major problem where fundamental security is concerned, it doesn't matter so much in embedded environments. Even still, Windows/IBM OS/2 is still heavily predominant in embedded environments such as ATMs and cash tills, and even DOS is often used to this day in some cash tills as well.

As for 60% of web searches being achieved through Linux, unless you can prove that, I will just say this: No.

Linux is used by the most successful ISPs, most cloud computing farms, and most of the T500 super computers.

I can't prove or disprove this, but with regards to what ISPs/cloud computing farms use I suspect this statement is partly correct relating to what I said earlier with Linux/*nix being more common on the backend. The frontend will almost certainly be Windows.

(1)Linux is also used in some mobile phones (if you have heard of Symbian, that is a form of Linux.) however I am not aware of it being more popular than Windows Mobile, Android or iPhone OS.

Excuse me for being somewhat confused by all these posts saying Linux is crap.

My actual opinion of Linux isn't that it is crap. I just tend to make it seem like that when idiots come along and blindly state that it's more secure than Windows (which it isn't, and I've already given enough reasons why) and that it is more stable than Windows, again, I have found this to not be true. People are fine to have their opinions but when it turns into arrogance and fanboi'ism it gets on my grape and that's when I tend to lash out. The fact is, if Windows was as crap as the fanbois make out, it wouldn't be used everywhere and anywhere. Linux itself isn't crap (and I haven't once said that), but it *does* have a crap kernel because of the simple reason that it is monolithic, and a monolithic kernel *can not* ever be secure. Ever. And the only reason I brought all of that up in the first place is because of GV trying to be a smartarse unaware that there would be someone, a.k.a., me, reading this thread who would actually be able to call him out on every single one of his points.

 

[Geezertronic]

I have worked for many FSTE 100 companies and all have had Linux, most reputable companies have some flavour of Linux or AIX for their various requirements whether they be frontend or backend

My current IT Project for my current contract is ISP related. I cannot go into too much detail but the system we are building is based on the ISP system currently run by a big ISP up North (who are now owned by BT and are doing a serious ad campaign in London) and we're building the upgraded system based on the Debian Lenny flavour of Linux (and MySQL). - front end and backend. The company I am contracted to also manage another ISP system which is based on RedHat

As for security, I would say that the vast majority of virus's are written with Windows in mind which by definition makes Windows more vulnerable unless it is fully patched and has a decent virus scanner on it

 

[yorkie]

If you actually watch the video, you will see that moving the mouse at anything faster than a sloth's rate, causes the window to jump about the screen violently. See the top part of this post for the 'point' I've been trying to make all along.

The point is clearly that WinAmp (does anyone still use it?!) is buggy.

Right; that must be the reason I've never managed more than a week's uptime on Linux, my Mac was even worse, and yet my Windows XP machine, which as it happens is a pretty duffed up install anyway, is sitting on 61 days of uptime, my Vista machine at work is on one month (would be almost three now, however I decided to reboot it purely by choice) and that I've had several months off Windows 95 before?

Several months uptime on Win95?
Hard to believe that the system was actually being used for that period! Whatever the box was doing (clearly not very much) would possibly result in many years of uptime under Linux (assuming no hardware failures!)

Faster? I don't think so buddy. Linux is slower to boot, slower to shut down, slower to run programs, slower to write and read files to disk...

You must be the only person on the planet to come to that conclusion! All the evidence I have seen suggests otherwise.

I could go on... You probably *think* it's faster because it's not susceptible to so many viruses like Windows is, because it doesn't have a market share worth bothering with,

NO! You clearly do not understand why Linux is much more secure. It's easy for a virus to run with administrative rights on Windows. This is not the case with Linux!

the bottlekneck is almost never due to fragmentation but rather the drive controller, spindle speed, seek time and other factors.

They are all factors that determine throughput. You could equally re-word it to say "The bottleneck is not the drive controller, but fragmentation" and, on a severely fragmented volume, that would be right! So really, this sentence has no meaning. Further when you consider what fragmentation is - files being split all over the disk - surely then factors like the spindle speed determine how quickly these fragments can be put together?

Fragmentation isn't as a big a deal as some people claim, but it's still a factor, and you can't pretend it isn't.

Please learn something before spouting utter tripe about computers, OSes and superiority, and that applies for all of you. Don't even get me started on Linux security and why its kernel absolutely sucks.

Oooh, the irony!

Rather than get you started on why the Linux kernel "sucks", just provide a few links and we can make up our own minds.

You have to consider why it's you versus everyone else, on a forum where the majority of users are actually using Windows.

 

[thefab444]

At the end of the day, the choice of OS is up to the user/IT dept, no amount of hand bag throwing on here will make any difference.

 

[466.networkers]

:/ dude. I work for an IT firm, and we manage quite a number of clients. NONE use Linux. Not a breath of Linux anywhere. It's pure Windows out where we are, and for a lot of the frontend business world. Sure, some of the backend in large firms is done in *nix type systems, but that's about it.

As for 'intelligent mobile phones', as far as I know the leading ones at the moment are HTC which either run Google's Android OS or Windows Mobile. Also, Apple's iPhone is pretty damn smart. No sign of Linux here?(1)





Yes, the one thing that Linux really does well is embedded applications and portable devices. This is because the Kernel, unlike the Windows Kernel, can be modified, configured and patched to suit the purpose. If you build your own Linux Kernel with exactly what you want, you can tailor it to certain uses. With Windows you just get what you are given regardless... and Windows embedded is a joke. While the monolithic kernel of Linux is also a major problem where fundamental security is concerned, it doesn't matter so much in embedded environments. Even still, Windows/IBM OS/2 is still heavily predominant in embedded environments such as ATMs and cash tills, and even DOS is often used to this day in some cash tills as well.

As for 60% of web searches being achieved through Linux, unless you can prove that, I will just say this: No.




I can't prove or disprove this, but with regards to what ISPs/cloud computing farms use I suspect this statement is partly correct relating to what I said earlier with Linux/*nix being more common on the backend. The frontend will almost certainly be Windows.

(1)Linux is also used in some mobile phones (if you have heard of Symbian, that is a form of Linux.) however I am not aware of it being more popular than Windows Mobile, Android or iPhone OS.





My actual opinion of Linux isn't that it is crap. I just tend to make it seem like that when idiots come along and blindly state that it's more secure than Windows (which it isn't, and I've already given enough reasons why) and that it is more stable than Windows, again, I have found this to not be true. People are fine to have their opinions but when it turns into arrogance and fanboi'ism it gets on my grape and that's when I tend to lash out. The fact is, if Windows was as crap as the fanbois make out, it wouldn't be used everywhere and anywhere. Linux itself isn't crap (and I haven't once said that), but it *does* have a crap kernel because of the simple reason that it is monolithic, and a monolithic kernel *can not* ever be secure. Ever. And the only reason I brought all of that up in the first place is because of GV trying to be a smartarse unaware that there would be someone, a.k.a., me, reading this thread who would actually be able to call him out on every single one of his points.

Mac OS (and therefore iPhone OS) are based loosely on Unix on which Linux is based on ...

Linux is mainly used for servers, I don't know the proper figures, but 60% of searches sounds about right.

Windows Mobile is slowly being phased out of use by the mobile phone manufacturers, in its place is Google's Android OS, Symbian (owned by Nokia) and a slimmed down Linux distro called Maemo. See this link for more information about the Nokia N900 which will be the first phone to come with Maemo OS installed.

 

[Old Timer]

The Update
OK chaps, well its good news, and bad news.

Firstly I obtained a Toshiba Tecra M5 and downloaded the Ubuntu Linux programme onto it.

Relatively easy and straightforward, but those guys neeed to get hold of someone who is less of a "Techy" to write up the installation instructions if they really want this to take off.

Anyway, I have to say I was mightily impressed by what I saw of the programme.

Now the bad news.

It turns out that the Toshiba Tecra M5 was specifically designed for Windows XP and whilst it can run Ubuntu, the installed display card (Nvidia) does not support Linux in any shape or form, and thus it was not possible to successfully use Ubuntu in a day to day manner, even using an Nvidia Linux driver

The Toshiba site also indicates that the majority of drivers are set for Windows, as there is no Linux versions of pretty much any of the drivers one would need, so this effectively rules this particular model out.



On an aside however, I notice there is a brand new barebones 15" laptop (2Gb RAM / 160Gb hard drive) which has no operating system installed for sale on the Saverstore site, Saverstore, which I am very tempted to buy, install Ubuntu as the operating system and run it.

In response to all the comments, and recognising the obviously higher computing skills of many people here, I have to say that my experience of Ubuntu so far has been very positive.

Anyway thanks to all for the various comments.

 

[Geezertronic]

Check out the link below to see if it offers any extra advice:

http://wiki.poggs.com/mediawiki/index.php/Installing_Linux_on_a_Toshiba_Tecra_M5

 

[yorkie]

The Toshiba site also indicates that the majority of drivers are set for Windows, as there is no Linux versions of pretty much any of the drivers one would need, so this effectively rules this particular model out.

Ubuntu usually works reasonably well "out of the box" without any proprietary drivers.

 

[JustinStacey.x]

It's nice to know that I put a perfectly harmless post here and someone went and removed it. Nice one, guys.

 

[Old Timer]

Ubuntu usually works reasonably well "out of the box" without any proprietary drivers.

Yes, I am not sure why there is a graphics card problem.

It manifested itself as a very low intensity screen. There was also an insoluble problem with using a separate desktop screen via the VGA.

I could not get the system to start to desktop screen, even though it could see it and had all the right attributes.

It was at this point that I established that the Fn/F5 toggle would not operate, so I went looking on the Toshiba site for a Linux driver, to find a big blank space against my particular model sub-code.

As the intention was to use the laptop configured to the desktop screen, this of course has major implications. Anyway I have restored the Tecra to Windows XP and I may play about with Windows 7 on it.

For the main computer, I will build a new desktop I think. As far as Ubuntu is concerned, I may well put that onto the new desktop to save the costs of buying another set of Windows 7, and Office licenses.

 

[generalvegitable]

As for 'intelligent mobile phones', as far as I know the leading ones at the moment are HTC which either run Google's Android OS ... No sign of Linux here?(1)

erm wrong, google android IS a Linux distribution

 

[yorkie]

It's nice to know that I put a perfectly harmless post here and someone went and removed it. Nice one, guys.

It was, in my opinion a pointless spam-style post that added nothing to the topic whatsoever and could be interpreted as a dig toward Old Timer. If you want to discuss it, then please do so via PM rather than on the forum, and if you want to complain about the action, you are welcome to contact an Admin.

Back to the topic in question, generalvegitable is correct, Google Android runs on the Linux kernel so it is incorrect to say "no sign of Linux here".