[GRLUG] Linux use

[Michael Mol]

On Fri, Aug 26, 2011 at 1:54 PM, Bob Kline <bob.kline at gmail.com> wrote:
> Indeed.  That's where the M$ monopoly
> really pays off.  Vendors would much
> rather support just one version of their
> software than three or more - windoz,
> OS X, and Linux, for example.  Much
> more profitable to have one near universal
> platform.

My day job, primarily, is writing special-purpose software that runs
on Windows. It's no wear near as idyllic a setting for ISVs as you
seem to think it is. Your average Windows machine is loaded down with
so many craptastic interfering software written by other ISVs, it's
very difficult to know whether or not problems are from real bugs in
*your* program, or whether something like Google Desktop Search or
some antivirus program went, "Hey, there's a file that was just
created. Let's go peek inside and see what's in there," locked the
file exclusively, and caused a fault in your program when a piece of
internal data wasn't accessible where it should have been.

I would far, far, far rather write an app that would run on Linux,
packaged for and tested against a "stable" release of Debian, an "LTS"
release of Ubuntu or just about any release of RHEL. It would be a far
saner and more comfortable place to be. With Windows, an ISV sometimes
get a choice as to what environment his software is going to run in
and what other interfering apps are mandated. Throw my software in a
secure sandbox, locked down with limited access to the rest of your
network, and let it do its thing. Don't put me in a place where

Now, don't get me wrong; I don't hate Windows. I actually have a fair
amount of respect and understanding of it at a low level. What I
loathe is how badly ISV apps are written that they interfere with each
other.

-- 
:wq

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