Why I like Microsoft (long post)

[CronoMan]

I think it might be about time I explain why I'm so willing to defend so many of microsoft's product, and even to some degree the ones that fail, if anyone is interested in listening

I've been around computers for a while, both professionally and as an amateur in different fields
In my opinion, Microsoft deserves alot more credit than they usually get, and I'll try to explain my standpoint around this
First of all, I'm not a zealot. I don't really care who makes what, as long as its what I want and what I need (and what I believe others should take a more serious interest in)
For as long as I can remember, I've always wanted computers to be "not stupid", they're getting there, but there are alot of the developers and engineers who really seem to try to hold it back, because of what you could describe as zeal.
There are alot of programmers that still use C as the primary development tool. But I guess you don't really understand how much unnecessary code you have to write and figure out, until you don't need to anymore. Microsoft has spent alot of time making computers easier for everyone; not just the end-users. As you probably know, BASIC has been more or less a kind of trademark for Microsoft, which was something that initially sparked alot of interest in MSDOS; it came with a BASIC compiler. They have surely more often than not, been on the forefront of userfriendlyness, and most noticably for developers. Windows has a builtin debug-tool, where you can attach any process to another process to catch any unhandled exceptions (which is why "this program has caused an illegal operation" shows where it happened, and what it tried to do), something that you would need a host-process for in other operating systems (a program that runs and monitors a child process).
You may thing "what's the big difference", but the very subtle but importat issue here, is that a hosting application is a lot harder to write, because you have to make the entire debug process without any help from the operating system. This is important because it lets developers be more productive and innovative, without having to spend time on things they really shouldn't worry about (we worry enough as it is).
So is true for any aspect of development. In most cases Microsoft has done a very good job at letting developers focus on the important part of their applications, this goes for application development, web applications and game development. They have pretty much covered these fields almost to the edge of perfection. I'll give some examples to each category here :

Applications :

Visual Basic - VB gets alot of pepper, especially in recent years, of people who never used it
Cross-technology control libraries (ActiveX for instance) - A simple way a developer can easily implement any control in any development tools (for instance, Visual Basic <-> C++)
Visual Studio - Seriously, completely unrivaled.
.NET - A perfect framework for a perfect world. Properly integrated with the operating system, and no restrictions on use.
SQL Server - The absolute easiest to use of any SQL database, and astonoshingly powerful
SQL Server Express - Small lightweight database, for simple, seamless integration with any type of application

Web applications :
Internet Information Services - Although some people have earlier complained about it being insecure (not anymore though it seems) its simplicity is unrivaled. Want to add another application? Click "Add". No need to know any stupid commands or search through any configuration files
ASP.NET - The thing here is that they're splitting up the presentation and logic layers. Adds component structure (which has been common in normal applications for many years) and event handling for web applications. Easy to maintain, easy to write, easy easy easy

Game Development :
DirectX - There are alot of people who say bad things about DirectX (Especially Direct3D), usually these people don't understand Direct3D, and only use OpenGL for exact that reason. You might think that not understanding Direct3D means that Direct3D is harder than OpenGL; in a sense, it's true. OpenGL is immediately alot easier than Direct3D, but it's alot like saying that C is easier than C++, which is also true in a sense. C is easier than C++ only for people who don't understand C++, once you do that, C++ will save you time, and improve your horizon so much that you would be laughing at your former self. This is also true for Direct3D.
XNA - Start working on your engine and content, without having to screw around with devices and such things that most would deem "unnecessary". Talking of which ; http://loot-ninja.com/2009/06/09/valve-s huts-out-too-complicated-ps3/

I suspect alot of engineers tend to be scared off by "things being too simple", the expectation that programming should be reserved for people with superior intellect. But what they seem to forget, is that its not what you write that's important, its what it does. Any "stupid person" will make "stupid-person" mistakes no matter what the lingo is; the quality is lesser not because they don't understand what they're doing, but because they have no idea how to do it. You'll see people doing the weirdest things, and it doesn't really matter what the tool is;

bool IsTrue(bool val)
{
    return val == true;
}

could just as well be

IsTrue proc
cmp val, 1
je rettrue
mov eax, 0
ret
rettrue:
mov eax, 1
ret
IsTrue endp

Even though the last one requires more detail in knowledge, it doesn't in any way require you to make intelligent decisions.

I'm going to hail any side, as long as they're moving in the direction I want; more abstraction and less tedious work. Don't get me wrong, I think its fun tinkling with lowlevel programming every once in a while, but in all seriousness, that won't take us anywhere. Microsoft is doing a great job at innovating computer technology, and currently the only part that is trying they're absolute best to progress.

I've found myself almost in tears over some of their other software though, like Internet Explorer, and Office. What I'm amazed about in these products, is that they both have things that make them superior in a sense. IE sucks ass for displaying webpages, since nothing ever displays properly there; but have you tried the developer tools?
MS Office is very premenstrual, they have made some idiotic choices, like using Jet for a database in Outlook. It usually don't work, and it has very few options on fileformats, and it's simply put very hard to be comfortable around. But have you noticed the competition? No matter how shitty Office seems to be, take a look at OpenOffice in comparison. Yeah I know, you'll think I'm somewhat biased, but honestly, I had almost never touched Office (except in school) until a couple of years ago. Before that I used OpenOffice. Before that, StarOffice. And its kind of weird when you move onto something that you have always disliked before actually getting into it. Suddenly you sit there and you realise that you didn't really know which were the lesser evil.

I won't defend IE much over the development tools, but if you do alot of web development, you need to check out the development tools in IE8. You'll be surprised.

Now, more on Windows, which in my opinion, has gotten alot more criticism than it actually deserves. Sure it has it its annoyances like ANY OTHER SOFTWARE ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH, but most of it is relatively minute.

[CronoMan]

One of the things I dislike about windows, is Explorer. Personally, I think its a bad idea to not break such an important part of the interface into smaller parts.
What annoys me the most, is how other applications interact with Explorer (or vice versa, dependong on point of view)
For instance, when you open the context-menu in an folder window, this list can be altered by modules registered in the registry. This part should've been more restricted, only allowing software to do tasks most common. Whenever you right-click anywhere, it will call a function in all loaded modules to populate the context menu which makes it very dynamic, but with a certain annoying cost. This only work well if the module that gets queried is well-programmed, which few are. The really annoying thing about this is that it allows any module to do whatever it want, and spend as much time it wants, on populating its context menu. This is because the context-menu is actually quite primitive, in a clever way; it calls a function in said modules, providing the hWND (handle) to the newly acquired menu.
Explorer also have a problem with the message-loop. Have you experienced that you're starting the computer, and when you hover over the taskbar, you just get that "wait"-symbol? That's because Explorer has executed a function in a separate module in its main thread, essentially casually giving away your precious time to modules unknown.
I also miss a way of seeing what drivers are eating away at my memory. On my laptop, it seems that a double quantity of RAM gets allocated for every application. Process says "20MB", close the process, resource monitor says "you now have 40MB more free ram" without me being able to spot where the extra 20MB went.

I also really really hate that applications and message boxes can try to forcefully take my attention. Ever written something while installing something, and then suddenly a popup-box with the option "Cancel" pops up just when you press enter? What the fuck is up with that. I'll do what I want to do, you can give me a hint that you need my attention, BUT DON'T TAKE IT WITHOUT MY PERMISSION, I might be doing something important. The whole deal with computers is that they're supposed to be an aid, not ever a pain in the ass. I don't see why it is necessary for an application to claim the attention of the user automatically without any user interaction.

Ever noticed how important everyone think their software is? Windows applications are the masters of self-importance. Whenever you install an application, it acts like its the center of the fucking universe. "Would you like to tatoo my logo in your forehead?" A couple of days ago, I had to find a component for ASP.NET that you could skin. Basically just buttons, checkboxes, radiobuttons and whatnot that I could alter to match the design on a website. I then stumbled upon a component that took over 300 MB somehow, and it acted like I had just installed the new messiah on my harddrive. It took about 10-20 minutes to install, and it added a page for itself to the webserver, and added a filesystem watched that was keeping an eye on My Documents for some reason and all kinds of unexpected shit. Come on, I just needed some simple ASP.NET component. No way I'm installing that much crap on a production server, so that my eyes can rest when I see a dropdown list.

Now some of the things I do like about windows

Windows is more or less a haven for developers. You have everything right there for you to use, and you don't have to rely any extra abstraction components just to write colored text to the console *cough*ncurses*cough*
Thanks to the builtin modularity of the operating system, everything is within your grasp, without having to resort to any tricks and hacks. I've seen so many weird solutions for seemingly simple problems in my days of screwing around with linux. Libraries depending on libraries depending a specific versioned library, depending on a compiler which depends on libraries into infinity.
Applications running applications it can parse the output of. Sometimes you start to wonder if anyone developing for competing operating systems is going to, just for one moment, raise their heads and look at how things are done in windows programming. You would never have to rely on a console applications to do anything, EVER. If it provides a service, that service is situated outside the application itself, so that it can be used by other applications if needed and intended. In windows, using dynamic libraries is as natural as wearing pants. Well, I guess you don't always wear pants, but if you want to appear respectable, it's usually a good idea.

Before I end up completely derailed, I'll end it here;
In conclusion, Microsoft does a very good job. They create software people wants, and they keep moving things forward. Most people don't really notice it, because they're much too focused on unremarkable applications like Internet Explorer and Office. Look at what they do for developers, and you'll probably understand why I'm viewing them from my current perspective

[elbekko]

Excellent post.

I must completely agree that Windows with .NET is the best and easiest application development platform I've ever come across. Things work, things are logical.
But I do believe that before .NET it was quite a bit less rosy on Windows; things were less clear, less documented and overall harder to use. But ofcourse that's just my nearly worthless opinion because I did very little of that.

[Alphabit]

I soooo agree with that part where you mention that some software engineers feel like things MUST be made complicated... Seriously, I HATE the way operating systems were designed with respects to device drivers... Seriously, have you tried reading the USB 2.0 specifications? LOL the thing is like 650 PAGES!!!!! OMG! And then they have all these different device classes and COMPLICATED protocols... I don't even know how they can possibly expect for someone to be able to make their own device drivers from scratch - It's a really complex and mostly non-nonsensical, counter-intuitive, unintelligent process.

I tried reading some documentation on generic HID device drivers to see how they could be used to communicate with a simple hardware device; the bloody thing is 90 PAGES!!! And although it's less cryptic than the massive 650 page USB 2.0 specs, it still has a LOT OF GAPS in information... Like the protocols are fairly clear, but it doesn't even address the basic problem of communicating bits of information over a serial port.

The whole Idea of device drivers seem so simple; you have a computer and a device; you just need a protocol to get the two to communicate with one another; and all the binary data transfers are handled at the application level using a simple API... Why the HELL would you create all this nonsense thousands of pages of cumulative specification documentation to carry-out such a basic task.
I must say though; Microsoft is ESPECIALLY GUILTY of over-complicating everything. Seriously, have you seen the Windows API!! OMG! The thing is a mess; if I handed-in code this MESSY (and that completely disregarded the concept of abstraction) as part of a computer science project at University, I would do very poorly for that course. Seriously, just look at Linux's Gnome environment and it's like OMFG; THAT is what an API is supposed to be like... Apple's one is also much better than Microsoft's.

Personally though, I think all operating systems are pretty poorly designed; we need to keep in mind that when they were started, there was no such thing as a 'software engineer' - at best they were electrical engineers who happened to program or they were just hobbyist programmers; still experimenting with the software design side of things. After they got better and started coming up with design patterns and paradigms of good software architecture; it was too late to change things because of 'backward compatibility' issues... Now we have one massive pile of CRAP. I mean, all the OS vendors KNOW that their old code is a pile of crap; that's why they came up with languages like C# and Visual basic; that way you don't have to touch the filthy API; it's all wrapped up in neat little classes.

[Wonderful]

I love Windows, don't get me wrong, but there is quite a bit of learning it could do from *nix type systems. I'd like to see a more fully-featured command prompt. It's okay for people whom only use it on occasion, but if I want something done nice and quickly without having to navigate through GUI's, the Windows Command Prompt comes up fairly short alot of the time. Another thing I'd like to see is a package manager. I use Windows for all of my life, but when I decided to give Linux a shot, the package manager was a godsend, I can't image how I worked without it.

Just my $0.02.

[zNelson24]

Visual C# Express / XNA Game Studio - The thing that got me making games for free. C# is also my first programming language.

Games Explorer - Neat little feature that was introduced in Windows Vista. This basically allows you to launch all your games from one folder. You can also stress test your system to see if it matches the required/recommended WEI scores (for those who arent the most computer savy) for running your games. If someone would kindly tell me how to add Games Explorer support on a ClickOnce installer, I would be greatful.

[kiwi-kiwi]

At 6/11/09 03:19 PM, Wonderful wrote: I'd like to see a more fully-featured command prompt.

Have you tried powershell?

I like also like Microsoft for making everything so easy to install and run. I occasionally use Linux for gcc, to learn openGL, networking etc and I've looked into distributing an app for others to use and I had to look into making repos, then determine all dependencies and so forth. In visual studio it's just 4-5 clicks away using the installer project.
I guess it's because I'm used to using GUIs

[CronoMan]

At 6/11/09 12:58 PM, Alphabit wrote: I soooo agree with that part where you mention that some software engineers feel like things MUST be made complicated... Seriously, I HATE the way operating systems were designed with respects to device drivers...

In my wild erotic fantasies, I dream that device drivers are created by implementing an interface to a class, for instance :

class SoundBlaster16 : ISoundDevice
{
public:
    bool Initialize(int resolution, int frequency, int channels);
    void PlayBuffer(byte *buffer, int index, int count, int demuxmode);
};

Although I believe there are other languages more suited for this task than C++, I used C++ as an example for the sake of clarity

[DearonElensar]

At 6/12/09 08:27 AM, J00blix wrote: Usually with Windows, your AIM is to "get shit done". Seems like with linux things become complicated trying to 'open source' your code. You must coordinate which features you would like to include in future distributions and whatnot!

You must coordinate what features you want anyway if your program/code is going to be used by anyone.
Otherwise you open yourself up to the wonderful world of feature creep and you will piss people off when their favorite feature get's dropped all of a sudden.
And what is so hard about open sourcing in itself? just pick a license and upload your code (now running a successful project is something different, but the same problems are present in a closed source development team)

[iMate900]

At 6/10/09 08:45 AM, CronoMan wrote: I think it might be about time I explain why I'm so willing to defend so many of microsoft's product, and even to some degree the ones that fail, if anyone is interested in listening

There are alot of programmers that still use C as the primary development tool. But I guess you don't really understand how much unnecessary code you have to write and figure out, until you don't need to anymore. Microsoft has spent alot of time making computers easier for everyone; not just the end-users. As you probably know, BASIC has been more or less a kind of trademark for Microsoft, which was something that initially sparked alot of interest in MSDOS; it came with a BASIC compiler.

MS-DOS only bundled a interpeter for BASIC.

...Windows has a builtin debug-tool, where you can attach any process to another process to catch any unhandled exceptions (which is why "this program has caused an illegal operation" shows where it happened, and what it tried to do), something that you would need a host-process for in other operating systems (a program that runs and monitors a child process).

Essissentally a host program attaching to a child.

...is that a hosting application is a lot harder to write, because you have to make the entire debug process without any help from the operating system.

Have you read the Linux ptrace man page?

This is important because it lets developers be more productive and innovative, without having to spend time on things they really shouldn't worry about (we worry enough as it is).

Sure if Windows recongized the fact to dissassemble the bad instruction.

So is true for any aspect of development. In most cases Microsoft has done a very good job at letting developers focus on the important part of their applications, this goes for application development, web applications and game development. They have pretty much covered these fields almost to the edge of perfection. I'll give some examples to each category here :

Applications :

Visual Basic...

is too BASIC.

Cross-technology control libraries (ActiveX for instance) - A simple way a developer can easily implement any control in any development tools (for instance, Visual Basic <-> C++)

A simple way to hijack the host's request.

Visual Studio - Seriously, completely unrivaled.

...and Microsoft has smothered .NET in it. Boring. wxDevcpp +1;

.NET - A perfect framework for a perfect world. Properly integrated with the operating system, and no restrictions on use.

...and properly assimalates into programs badly.

SQL Server - The absolute easiest to use of any SQL database, and astonoshingly powerful

And astonoshingly insecure. MySQL +1.

SQL Server Express - Small lightweight database, for simple, seamless integration with any type of application

And so for MySQL.

Web applications :
Internet Information Services - Although some people have earlier complained about it being insecure (not anymore though it seems) its simplicity is unrivaled.

It won't support PHP and MySQL. Switch to Apache.

ASP.NET - The thing here is that they're splitting up the presentation and logic layers. Adds component structure (which has been common in normal applications for many years) and event handling for web applications. Easy to maintain, easy to write, easy easy easy

The logic that is that ASP.NET is non-CGI which is more common to be CGI. Also bonked with .NET.

Game Development :
DirectX - There are alot of people who say bad things about DirectX (Especially Direct3D)

Direct my butt if I want to run your DX app under Linux.

XNA - Start working on your engine and content, without having to screw around with devices and such things that most would deem "unnecessary". Talking of which ; http://loot-ninja.com/2009/06/09/valve-s huts-out-too-complicated-ps3/

Now destroying Macs, PSPs, PS3s, and Linux. From M$.

...Microsoft is doing a great job at innovating computer technology...

They innovate nothing expect pushing their crap to us.

and currently the only part that is trying they're absolute best to progress.

I've found myself almost in tears over some of their other software though, like Internet Explorer, and Office. What I'm amazed about in these products, is that they both have things that make them superior in a sense. IE sucks ass for displaying webpages, since nothing ever displays properly there; but have you tried the developer tools?

Firefox+FireBug=pwns!

MS Office is very premenstrual, they have made some idiotic choices, like using Jet for a database in Outlook. It usually don't work, and it has very few options on fileformats, and it's simply put very hard to be comfortable around.

MS Office share 99%
OO 0.9%
REST 0.1%

Majority is false.

I won't defend IE much over the development tools, but if you do alot of web development, you need to check out the development tools in IE8. You'll be surprised.

Too fancy. Firefox+FireBug.

Now, more on Windows, which in my opinion, has gotten alot more criticism than it actually deserves. Sure it has it its annoyances like ANY OTHER SOFTWARE ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH, but most of it is relatively minute.

It gets criticism due to stupid choices on MS' side.

40% good
60% bad
Linux > MS

--
Remember IE is EVIL!

[CronoMan]

At 6/12/09 08:34 PM, iMate900 wrote: MS-DOS only bundled a interpeter for BASIC.

You're point being..

Essissentally a host program attaching to a child.

No, essentially not a host application. Windows dispatches unhandled exceptions, other processes that attaches themself the the process (without spawning the process) can handle these events

Have you read the Linux ptrace man page?

No.

Sure if Windows recongized the fact to dissassemble the bad instruction.

Windows is not a disassembler.

Visual Basic...

is too BASIC.

You clearly fail to see what Visual Basic did to how programmers relate to computer code

A simple way to hijack the host's request.

No its not, ActiveX is a module like anything else, if you say this, it goes for all "hookable" libraries, which includes.. well... everything.

...and Microsoft has smothered .NET in it. Boring. wxDevcpp +1;

How is that boring?
DevCpp is like the little retarded kid smashing in to poles in the playground of IDE's, compared to Visual Studio

.NET - A perfect framework for a perfect world. Properly integrated with the operating system, and no restrictions on use.

...and properly assimalates into programs badly.

Please explain, I'd love to hear this

SQL Server - The absolute easiest to use of any SQL database, and astonoshingly powerful

And astonoshingly insecure. MySQL +1.

Hahaha? Please provide me a link that says that.
Also, go to #SQL on EFNet, start talking about MySQL and see how long it takes before they kick you out of the room. It's funny how the professional environment would never consider using MySQL for anything other than personal projects.

SQL Server Express - Small lightweight database, for simple, seamless integration with any type of application

And so for MySQL.

MySQL is not small and lightweight compared to SQL Server Express. Read more about SQL Express before stating that MySQL is anything near it.

And compare SQL Server Studio to ANY MySQL GUI, and tell me how MySQL in any field can compete with MSSQL.

What fields would that be? Performance? No. Quantity of data? No. Transactional support? No. Full-text indexing? No. Reliability? No. Datatypes? No. Ease-of-use? No. Replication? No. Cross-domain support? No.
I wonder why it is that you have to use certain types of table engines in order for it to support certain things that you need. You can never have both the cake and eat it too, it's impossible in MySQL. InnoDB supports some things, MyISAM supports other things, non-overlapping.

Internet Information Services - Although some people have earlier complained about it being insecure (not anymore though it seems) its simplicity is unrivaled.

It won't support PHP and MySQL. Switch to Apache.

IIS supports PHP. It even supports PHP as an FastCGI application or as an ISAPI module.
What I like about IIS, is that I can do anything without ever having to restart the webserver; I can add and remove modules during runtime, and I can do this without EVER opening a fucking text editor, or reading a manual for that sake.

The logic that is that ASP.NET is non-CGI which is more common to be CGI. Also bonked with .NET.

What the fuck? Get off the drugs before replying please
I prefer to reply to a certain level of logic

DirectX - There are alot of people who say bad things about DirectX (Especially Direct3D)

Direct my butt if I want to run your DX app under Linux.

Come on.. Seriously. What if I DON'T? I'm discussing Direct3D, NOT LINUX and I frankly don't care about your personal opinion on which applications should be platform dependant. I'm talking about Direct3D, stick to the topic

XNA - Start working on your engine and content, without having to screw around with devices and such things that most would deem "unnecessary". Talking of which ; http://loot-ninja.com/2009/06/09/valve-s huts-out-too-complicated-ps3/

Now destroying Macs, PSPs, PS3s, and Linux. From M$.

XNA is for Windows and XBox360, IT'S NOT FOR MAC, PS3 OR LINUX
Releasing it for the competition to use, is suicide. Do you like suicide?

...Microsoft is doing a great job at innovating computer technology...

They innovate nothing expect pushing their crap to us.

Ok, so I guess .NET was not an innovation, nor was DLL's, and not run-time loading of modules, or Quartz (DirectShow)? Just because your close-mindedness refuse to realise what they've actually done (or because you live in an anti-microsoft bubble?) doesn't mean that its not there. Hell, Microsoft actually more or less gave us computers as we see today.

and currently the only part that is trying they're absolute best to progress.

I've found myself almost in tears over some of their other software though, like Internet Explorer, and Office. What I'm amazed about in these products, is that they both have things that make them superior in a sense. IE sucks ass for displaying webpages, since nothing ever displays properly there; but have you tried the developer tools?

Firefox+FireBug=pwns!

Well. Check out the IE8 debugger.

MS Office is very premenstrual, they have made some idiotic choices, like using Jet for a database in Outlook. It usually don't work, and it has very few options on fileformats, and it's simply put very hard to be comfortable around.

MS Office share 99%
OO 0.9%
REST 0.1%

Majority is false.

Majority is rarely false, it only complies to things things that are emotionally attachable, like music,art and religion. Computers should be treated objectively, I believe most (not including you) do that.
And like I said, no matter how much office sucks, take a look at the competition.

I won't defend IE much over the development tools, but if you do alot of web development, you need to check out the development tools in IE8. You'll be surprised.

Too fancy. Firefox+FireBug.

That's the stupidest argument I've ever heard. Does this look like a hair-salon?

Now, more on Windows, which in my opinion, has gotten alot more criticism than it actually deserves. Sure it has it its annoyances like ANY OTHER SOFTWARE ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH, but most of it is relatively minute.

It gets criticism due to stupid choices on MS' side.

While all the stupid decisions by free software should be blatantly ignored? Why? Because its free?

And what are these stupid choices? To make it cost money? Is that it?

Obviously its impossible to write a perfect computer application, so again, obviously mistakes are made. Windows is by far alot more professional than Linux.

40% good
60% bad
Linux > MS

You know, I'd like to see a day where Linux suddenly got as much market share as windows has now. All the possible exploits would show as clearly as the sun, when your on the surface of it. I'd like to see the day when someone gives root access to a pirated application that has malicious code in it. Tell how much an application CAN'T do with root access. In Windows, even the administrator can't do certain things (things that are reserved for System etc, or things that are intentionally blocked by the windows kernel, like the BIOS)

Oh, how I would like to see Linux blow up in all the fanatics face, once stupid people get around to use it. They'll be all "what? huh? but this is impossible! the filesystem won't allow it!"
And I'll be like "heh"

Linux has a completely different mindset than Windows, its a completely different world. A world of minimalism and the inner workings of a 1960 computer application. Don't do anything more than you absolutely have to. If you have to add or remove functionality, alter the core! So what if it needs to be recompiled, and everyone one the face of the earth has to do this process. I mean, you get what you pay for, right?

Remember IE is EVIL!

IE is evil, that I most certainly can agree on

[DearonElensar]

At 6/13/09 07:00 AM, CronoMan wrote: Obviously its impossible to write a perfect computer application, so again, obviously mistakes are made. Windows is by far alot more professional than Linux.

Depends on the market you are aiming for, Linux can be much more professional than Windows, just like Windows can be more professional than Linux.

Decent reply otherwise, tho i almost excepted more from you ;)

[DearonElensar]

At 6/13/09 07:00 AM, CronoMan wrote: You know, I'd like to see a day where Linux suddenly got as much market share as windows has now. All the possible exploits would show as clearly as the sun, when your on the surface of it. I'd like to see the day when someone gives root access to a pirated application that has malicious code in it. Tell how much an application CAN'T do with root access. In Windows, even the administrator can't do certain things (things that are reserved for System etc, or things that are intentionally blocked by the windows kernel, like the BIOS)

Oh, how I would like to see Linux blow up in all the fanatics face, once stupid people get around to use it. They'll be all "what? huh? but this is impossible! the filesystem won't allow it!"
And I'll be like "heh"

Linux has a completely different mindset than Windows, its a completely different world. A world of minimalism and the inner workings of a 1960 computer application. Don't do anything more than you absolutely have to. If you have to add or remove functionality, alter the core! So what if it needs to be recompiled, and everyone one the face of the earth has to do this process. I mean, you get what you pay for, right?

Aww, i responded too early.
Linux is starting to see much more use including that by "idiots", i'm not talking about Ubuntu but i am talking about government and schools that are switching to it.
Here is one such instance where it has been successfully deployed in schools, you might dislike Linux but i think you are severely underestimating it and it's power in being just as "modern" as Windows is to the end user (which is all that matters in these cases is it not?).
And people rarely recompile things themselves these days unless they really want to, hell there are projects around that allow you to replace the core binaries without a restart (removing the last instances where a reboot is needed) so even that aspect of changing something is slowly being replaced.
O and the whole root thing? Yeah a normal user shouldn't have root access anyway, and since most distributions have package tools you can easily train users to only install thing through there and to ignore software coming from any other source, making it much less likely that they will install rootkits or the like.
The whole "if Linux becomes popular" point is pretty void too, there are a lot of servers running Linux so it *is* popular and there are a lot of people working on trying to exploit it (and yes, there are a lot of exploits for Linux too) so don't even try to go there ;)

[iMate900]

MySQL is not small and lightweight compared to SQL Server Express

Ha! Read about MySQL Embedded, CronoMan!

And please look at Akondi in KDE 4. It embeds MySQL and yet works and hogs up little.

[iMate900]

At 6/13/09 07:00 AM, CronoMan wrote:

At 6/12/09 08:34 PM, iMate900 wrote: MS-DOS only bundled a interpeter for BASIC.

You're point being..

Read Wikipedia.

No, essentially not a host application.

Have you read the Linux ptrace man page?

No.

Then ptrace helps the prog via kern.

Windows is not a disassembler.

:)

is too BASIC.

You clearly fail to see what Visual Basic did to how programmers relate to computer code

It is still too simple for newbies. I'd use FreeBASIC anyway.

A simple way to hijack the host's request.

No its not, ActiveX is a module like anything else, if you say this, it goes for all "hookable" libraries, which includes.. well... everything.

The Story of Lib a, Lib b and Lib h
Lib a send request to Lib b
Lib h hooks Lib b
Lib h hijacks Lib a request and forges a fake return value

...and Microsoft has smothered .NET in it. Boring. wxDevcpp +1;

How is that boring?
DevCpp is like the little retarded kid smashing in to poles in the playground of IDE's, compared to Visual Studio

Visual Studio is too powerful for the newbie.

.NET - A perfect framework for a perfect world. Properly integrated with the operating system, and no restrictions on use.

...and properly assimalates into programs badly.

Please explain, I'd love to hear this

VS.NET is now common, so .NET is in evrything.

SQL Server - <snip>

And astonoshingly insecure. MySQL +1.

Hahaha? Please provide me a link that says that.

SQL Server has tons of holes.

Also, go to #SQL on EFNet, start talking about MySQL and see how long it takes before they kick you out of the room. It's funny how the professional environment would never consider using MySQL for anything other than personal projects.

Go to #mysql, butt about SQL Server being powerful, and prepare to be kicked.

SQL Server Express

And so for MySQL.

MySQL is not small and lightweight compared to SQL Server Express. Read more about SQL Express before stating that MySQL is anything near it.

MYSQL EMBEDDED!

And compare SQL Server Studio to ANY MySQL GUI, and tell me how MySQL in any field can compete with MSSQL.

phpMyAdmin is better.

What fields would that be? Performance? No. Quantity of data? No. Transactional support? No. Full-text indexing? No. Reliability? No. Datatypes? No. Ease-of-use? No. Replication? No. Cross-domain support? No.

Performace: ubuntuforums.org's database has tons of writes/sec.
Reliability: ubuntuforums.org has to be 24/7. Mysql helps.
While not easy to be, still better than MSSQL.

I wonder why it is that you have to use certain types of table engines in order for it to support certain things that you need. You can never have both the cake and eat it too, it's impossible in MySQL. InnoDB supports some things, MyISAM supports other things, non-overlapping.

Internet Information Services - Although some people have earlier complained about it being insecure (not anymore though it seems) its simplicity is unrivaled.

It won't support PHP and MySQL. Switch to Apache.

IIS supports PHP. It even supports PHP as an FastCGI application or as an ISAPI module.

whoops!
Security is a problem in IIS. won't support mysql authection!

The logic that is that ASP.NET is non-CGI which is more common to be CGI. Also bonked with .NET.

What the fuck? Get off the drugs before replying please
I prefer to reply to a certain level of logic

server logic.

DirectX - There are alot of people who say bad things about DirectX (Especially Direct3D)

Direct my butt if I want to run your DX app under Linux.

Come on.. Seriously. What if I DON'T? I'm discussing Direct3D, NOT LINUX and I frankly don't care about your personal opinion on which applications should be platform dependant. I'm talking about Direct3D, stick to the topic

mkay

XNA

Now destroying Macs, PSPs, PS3s, and Linux. From M$.

XNA is for Windows and XBox360, IT'S NOT FOR MAC, PS3 OR LINUX
Releasing it for the competition to use, is suicide. Do you like suicide?

a number of gamers are switching to mac and linux

...Microsoft is doing a great job at innovating computer technology...

They innovate nothing expect pushing their crap to us.

Ok, so I guess .NET was not an innovation, nor was DLL's, and not run-time loading of modules, or Quartz (DirectShow)? Just because your close-mindedness refuse to realise what they've actually done (or because you live in an anti-microsoft bubble?) doesn't mean that its not there. Hell, Microsoft actually more or less gave us computers as we see today.

.net is inno.
dlls aren't either (unix plz?)
runtime loading mods (unix plz too?)

and currently the only part that is trying they're absolute best to progress.

I've found myself almost in tears over some of their other software though, like Internet Explorer, and Office. What I'm amazed about in these products, is that they both have things that make them superior in a sense. IE sucks ass for displaying webpages, since nothing ever displays properly there; but have you tried the developer tools?

Firefox+FireBug=pwns!

Well. Check out the IE8 debugger.

Quick testing proves IE debugger is bad.

MS Office is very premenstrual, they have made some idiotic choices, like using Jet for a database in Outlook. It usually don't work, and it has very few options on fileformats, and it's simply put very hard to be comfortable around.

And like I said, no matter how much office sucks, take a look at the competition.

Still ADDDDVVVVANNNNCCEEED!

I won't defend IE much over the development tools, but if you do alot of web development, you need to check out the development tools in IE8. You'll be surprised.

Too fancy. Firefox+FireBug.

That's the stupidest argument I've ever heard. Does this look like a hair-salon?

the tools suck.

Now, more on Windows, which in my opinion, has gotten alot more criticism than it actually deserves. Sure it has it its annoyances like ANY OTHER SOFTWARE ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH, but most of it is relatively minute.

It gets criticism due to stupid choices on MS' side.

While all the stupid decisions by free software should be blatantly ignored? Why? Because its free?

THey mostly imitate MS' chocies!

And what are these stupid choices? To make it cost money? Is that it?

to make it easy 4 the user

Obviously its impossible to write a perfect computer application, so again, obviously mistakes are made. Windows is by far alot more professional than Linux.

Windows is also by far the most vulnaturable OS.

40% good
60% bad
Linux > MS

Oh, how I would like to see Linux blow up in all the fanatics face, once stupid people get around to use it. They'll be all "what? huh? but this is impossible! the filesystem won't allow it!"
And I'll be like "heh"

UbUnTu!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

1960 and windows crap

Remember IE is EVIL!

IE is evil, that I most certainly can agree is evil

I write this from a security, user-friendly, anti-MS and Linux user's view, and some parts have one view placed in mind.

Windows is a good OS, but I want Microsoft to provide a simple OS which only has the things users need to use in order to "build on" top the OS. Windows can contiune sold by MS, but the OS I described should be sold too.

50% bad and good

From my good and bad bubble, --iMate900

[thoughtpolice]

You know, I'd like to see a day where Linux suddenly got as much market share as windows has now. All the possible exploits would show as clearly as the sun, when your on the surface of it. I'd like to see the day when someone gives root access to a pirated application that has malicious code in it.

Well, by default linux DOES NOT give any regular user root permissions; you have to explicitly su or login via root to get that. So, by default a linux user is normally set up with little access outside their ~.

In the case of a regular user needing to do root-like shit, it's called 'sudo'. You can give fine-grained control to what applications users can and cannot run with root priviledges, so a user may be able to install packages with 'yaourt', but that's it - he can't "sudo rm -rf ~/", he can't "sudo cat /etc/passwd". He might not be able to uninstall packages either if you set up your sudo file properly.

On the other hand, with Windows, you pretty much were either Administrator or you weren't (not sure how much it has changed in vista/7, correct me if the following doesn't apply to them.) There is no point in denying the fact a large class of windows users simply have their account be the Administrator, BY DEFAULT, so they can do things like install software. There is no simple fine-grained access control mechanism to really give users certain permissions and deny them others in windows, and even then, the majority of people sure as hell probably don't use it, while in the case of e.g. ubuntu, sudo is by default the only way to get any sort of root priviledges. Yeah, okay, so even Administrator can't rm C:/WINDOWS/system32/ntoskrnl.exe, but by default Administrator can pretty much do everything else that could fuck up your system, so if someone has Administrator, there is still plenty they can do.

But other than that you seemed pretty right.

At 6/13/09 02:19 PM, iMate900 wrote: Read Wikipedia.

His point is that your trivialization isn't really all that important or worth mentioning.

No, essentially not a host application.

Have you read the Linux ptrace man page?

No.

Then ptrace helps the prog via kern.

Jesus christ, what the fuck does that even mean?

@CronoMan: Linux does have a viable way of looking into other processes and attaching to them - ptrace is the function which does exactly that (it's how you implement debuggers, etc..)

Read here if interested:
http://linux.die.net/man/2/ptrace

)

Stupid.

You clearly fail to see what Visual Basic did to how programmers relate to computer code

It is still too simple for newbies. I'd use FreeBASIC anyway.

Missed the point.

A simple way to hijack the host's request.

No its not, ActiveX is a module like anything else, if you say this, it goes for all "hookable" libraries, which includes.. well... everything.

The Story of Lib a, Lib b and Lib h
Lib a send request to Lib b
Lib h hooks Lib b
Lib h hijacks Lib a request and forges a fake return value

Just about every major operating system on earth has APIs, etc to do this programmatically in the general case, so you need to be more specific.

Visual Studio is too powerful for the newbie.

Agreed

Please explain, I'd love to hear this

VS.NET is now common, so .NET is in evrything.

What's your point?

Hahaha? Please provide me a link that says that.

SQL Server has tons of holes.

He said provide him a link, not 'your word' - either get results or shut up on the matter.

Also, go to #SQL on EFNet, start talking about MySQL and see how long it takes before they kick you out of the room. It's funny how the professional environment would never consider using MySQL for anything other than personal projects.

Go to #mysql, butt about SQL Server being powerful, and prepare to be kicked.

What? Of course you're going to get kicked out for shit talking MySQL in the #mysql IRC room. He's talking about going into a regular IRC channel and talking about getting kicked out for boasting mysql. Neither argument is really fair anyway because they don't say anything about the technical merits, but whatever.

phpMyAdmin is better.

Proof?

What fields would that be? Performance? No. Quantity of data? No. Transactional support? No. Full-text indexing? No. Reliability? No. Datatypes? No. Ease-of-use? No. Replication? No. Cross-domain support? No.

Performace: ubuntuforums.org's database has tons of writes/sec.
Reliability: ubuntuforums.org has to be 24/7. Mysql helps.
While not easy to be, still better than MSSQL.

What you just said means absolutely nothing.

Wow, yes, ubuntuforums is popular. Okay, how *many* database writes a second does it have? How do you know MySQL hasn't been their major bottleneck? How do you know MSSQL wouldn't give better throughput and connectivity/reliability?

You know none of these things, and furthermore you provide nothing in the case of MSSQL, making all your assertions all the more worthless (if that's possible.) On top of it all ubuntuforums is just one pathetic case of database usage in the real world (trivial to other places,) so you actually have no big-scale data to base your claims on either I imagine.

whoops!
Security is a problem in IIS. won't support mysql authection!

Then don't use MySQL?

XNA

Now destroying Macs, PSPs, PS3s, and Linux. From M$.

XNA is for Windows and XBox360, IT'S NOT FOR MAC, PS3 OR LINUX
Releasing it for the competition to use, is suicide. Do you like suicide?

a number of gamers are switching to mac and linux

Citation needed.

I write this from a security, user-friendly, anti-MS and Linux user's view, and some parts have one view placed in mind.

ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS?

You make me wait UNTIL THE END OF THE GODDAMN REPLY to tell me THAT NOTHING YOU SAID REALLY MEANT SHIT BECAUSE YOU'RE BIASED?

Fuck you kids these days.