Aeternus

Cap'n Refsmmat, i think he means getting them setup with file shares, printer shares etc rather than simple tcp/ip etc communication (at least thats what I assumed, could be wrong).

I don't know if Linux and Windows computers can be connected to the same network. You might be able to download a patch to get them connected. I don't know very much about Linux.

You can . I have it happening with my setup, Gentoo server pc hosts files and a cups print server and a Samba server and then my Gentoo desktop and my Windows XP laptop can both access the file share (passworded) and print normally (comes up as a normal printer). Samba uses the Windows networking protocols (they have reverse engineered them using packet sniffing etc) to allow everyone to get along nicely.

Sounds reasonable to me

and you have been shown that MS is crap as well and you basically respond with "MS is the greatest thing since sliced bread!"

Na, I have to disagree there. It hasn't been shown that MS/ Windows is crap, simply that there are alternatives and that these alternative are viable for certain people. It's been shown that Windows does have problems, that other operating systems have some problems too. Windows isn't crap but neither is Linux or Mac OS X. That is what I am trying to point out to herme3. You may disagree and that's your opinion, which is fair enough.

Why would anyone want to go through a lot of work to install hardware when it takes less time with Windows? Let's say you want to visit someone who lives a few miles away. You could get in a car, and drive there in a few minutes. Or, you could buy some plane tickets, fly all the way around the world, and get there using much more time and money. It makes no sense!

 

Even if you do know how to setup your hardware the difficult way, why wouldn't you just save the time and use Windows?

You personally had problems setting up things with ONE distro of UNIX. There are plenty of others for UNIX and there are also distros for LINUX that focus more on compatibility and hardware. On alot of systems you can simply install these and it will simply work. On others it wont (this is also true for things in Windows). Ok, with some hardware it may take a little extra time for some things, but as has been pointed out to you there are advantages in using Linux. I personally find it much easier and much faster to do things with a quick shell command on Linux (things that are MUCH harder to do via the Windows/DOS shell) than via a GUI. I also find that Media players such as MPlayer are far more likely to read partially corrupt or incomplete videos or media than Windows Media Player or a host of other Windows Players.

I enjoy the use of Workspaces in Gnome and the flexibility and ease of management it gives me in working with things across various windows. Yes this can be replicated on Windows but to paraphrase you "why should i go to the extra trouble when its already there in Linux?". I find it much easier to run a headless server setup, and ssh into it for use of irssi or to use a proxy client to the irssi proxy setup in the form of XChat rather than simply connecting directly to the IRC network, as it keeps me connected and logs important events. I thoroughly enjoy the ease with which i can update ALL of my system (not just the OS specific parts but the entire system, all applications included) using Gentoo's portage system and am amazed by how customisable it is with its various package.mask/.use/.keywords etc. The fact that various compilers and interpreters come as default in most Linux distros is an advantage to me as I enjoy that aspect of computing.

Seriously, the problems or percieved problems you are pointing out are either a) minor problems, b ) non-existant, or c) things that you consider to be important. You must understand that other people have different opinions of what is important. The fact is, my Gentoo system is far more responsive after prolonged use and even before than any Windows system I have used. It's memory management system uses as much memory as possible to cache recently used data or recently opened programs, leaving enough that programs can be loaded in without having to immediately swap out, making the best use of the memory available rather than just leaving it idle wastefully. Again, I am not saying Windows is crap, or that Linux is better than it, but you must understand that some people see advantages in Linux or Unix or Mac OS or any operating system that you dont appreciate as much in your use of a computer. These people have their own needs that Windows doesnt fulfill or that these other operating systems fulfill more easily or to a better degree in certain ways (stability, security, efficiency etc). If you can't understand that, then theres no point arguing with you, as then you are simply what yourdadonapogos says, a fanboy.

Its do with with the nucleus' effect (more specifically the protons) on the electrons at various distances from the nucleus and the diminishing of that effect due to shielding from other electrons. In Lithiums case there is an electron shell between the valence electrons and the nucleus (2 electrons in this shell) so we could say that there would be a +3 attractive charge towards the nucleus on that electron in the valence shell. However as we have this shell inbetween the effect of the charge from the nucleus is reduced, and we could say that there was perhaps only the equivalent of a +1 charge on this outer electron, meaning that it becomes much easier for this electron to be attracted towards other nuclei.

Chlorine has 2 shells totaling 10 electrons between the nucleus and the valence shell so we could say that the 17 protons resulting in roughly +17 unit charge would be reduced to roughly +7 (this isnt exactly the case and it is alot more complicated than I am making it out to be, there is shielding amount orbitals and therefore within each shell and the explanations are probably far more complex than I am making out) in the outer shell. So each of these valence electrons has this +7 charge pulling it towards the nucleus, a far stronger charge than lithiums valence electron had.

It is this difference in effective nuclear charge that means the difference in how it will lose its electrons or gain new electrons (chlorines large nucleus with few shells shielding means it can attract other electrons away from other atoms).

This can also be thought of in terms of energy required and energy gained from the loss of the electrons and the subsequent bonding formed, the fact that chlorines nucleus holds a greater sway on its electrons means it is much harder to pull an electron away from chlorine and so alot of reactions wouldnt be energetically feasible (although there are some reactions that involve chlorine losing electrons).

I'm sure someone far more qualified than me will come and correct me on numerous things or possibly even completely blow what I have said out of the water, but this is how things are explained as fair as I know at my level.

You'll notice that Valency is the number of electrons an atom will happily recieve or give up -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valency_%28chemistry%29

So Lithium and Chlorine both have a valency of 1 as Lithium gives up its 1 valence shell electron (2,1 electron shell config to simply 2), and Chlorine will take in 1 electron to fill its outer shell (basic understanding) (2,8,7 to 2,8,8). Lithium loses its electron becoming positive (+1), Chlorine gains an electron becoming negative (-1). Are you perhaps asking why this occurs??

The people that make the other operating systems don't need to make drivers for the hardware. Almost all hardware comes with drivers. The people that make other operating systems just need to figure out why the drivers won't work on their operating system.

 

Complaining about Windows XP not being compatible with legacy equipment is just plain stupid. One of my computers was made in 1999, and Windows XP works great on it. If your computer is older than that, I think it is time you buy a new computer.

ROFL!!!

Ok AGAIN, you seem to be missing the point. The drivers arent written using some generic setup that works on every platform, the majority are written based on Windows API's and Windows system calls. Linux and Mac OS and Unix and a variety of other operating systems are different systems, they are not Windows, they do not have the same API calls, in fact, they probably wouldnt even be allowed to as those API calls etc are something that Microsoft probably own due to copyright etc. The whole point is, different operating systems work in different ways and are more efficient or comfortable or stable or "advantage X" because of this. If everyone was exactly like Windows, what the hell would be the point?

Also, you say that they dont work, did you go find the NDIS wrappers? They do work. They let the windows drivers work on non windows systems. Note they are WINDOWS drivers, not generic drivers, not "works everywhere drivers", WINDOWS drivers. The drivers are made to work with Windows, Windows doesnt make the drivers work with it, that is just a byproduct of its success.

I'm not slanting Windows, its a great OS but please just think about what your saying and realise that Windows isnt the end all, and that there are other reasons behind things other than "the OS is crap" and also that just because you have to put a little work in sometimes, doesnt mean its not worth it.

Also please realise that a ) FreeBSD is not Linux, and that there are many DIFFERENT Linux AND Unix operating Systems and they can all be very different, allowing alot of choice, sampling one is not sampling them all, b ) FreeBSD is considered to be one of the most rock stable and secure OS' around and Gaz has already provided evidence of this. It isn't OLD it is experienced and has had alot of time to improve, but it isn't necessarily striving for the all round Desktop machine as it is often used on Server machines etc.

You mention that people who have legacy hardware should just "get a new computer". That is YOUR philosophy, you are quite happy to throw away hardware that still works perfectly and can do exactly what a person might need, but others arent. As Gaz has stated his older equipment is perfect for a variety of things and just for the record, PowerPC processors arent "legacy hardware" they are the processors currently used in Macs and the fact that Linux OS' work on them allows people to experiment and allows Mac users to have an alternative IF THEY WISH.

Don't apply your narrow view of what a computer should do to everything. Your needs aren't everyones needs. I asked you to find a respect for the different operating systems, not a love.

PS - Pangloss, i don't think anyone is saying "Linux is the end all", I think we are just trying to get herme3 to realise that Windows isn't the end all, and that there are other options. Some of the posts come out rather pro linux/unix but only because they wish to highlight their advantages or Windows disadvantages purely to prove the point, not to prove that Windows is any less of an OS or that Linux or Unix operating systems are the end all.

That challenge is actualy VERY misleading. Read over the source with the JS VERY carefully and note exactly what is happening on each line. I won't spoil it for you but if you get really stuck pm me for some more clues.

PS - I agree with radiohead, the challenges are more misdirection and puzzles rather than normal network security and others, although you can learn alot from these types of games (not for "hacking" but simply about how things work (ie HTTP protocol, encryption etc).

If they arent simply File1.txt, File2.txt but are more complicated file names you can use -

<?php
$dp = opendir('/fictionall/');
while ( $file = readdir($dp) ) {
   if ( !in_array( $file, array('.','..') ) ) {
       echo '<a href="/fictionall/' . $file . '">' . $file . "</a>\n";
   }
}
closedir($dp);
?>

That will allow just a simply flat directory with any file names. You can obviously just add particular file names to the array() in the if statement to exclude them from display. If there are alot of files you dont want to display, then using this method might not be the best and instead you might want to use something along the lines of glob() if your files match a particular pattern such as a particular extension or something, or you could add more checks such as various regexes or other things when checking if a file shouldnt be displayed.

If you have a simply directory structure that needs to be displayed rather than a flat directory, this would be more helpful -

<?php
function showDir( $dir )
{
   $dp = opendir($dir);
   while ( $file = readdir($dp) ) {
       if ( !in_array( $file, array('.','..') ) ) {
           if ( is_dir($dir . '/' . $file) ) {
               showDir($dir . '/' . $file);
           } else {
               echo '<a href="/' . $dir . '/' . $file . '">/' . 
                       $dir . '/' . $file . "</a>\n";
           }
       }
   }
   closedir($dp);
}
showDir('fictionall');
?>

If you have lots and lots and lots and lots of directories beneath the directory you're listing, be careful as this function is recursion and you dont want to keep shoving function callbacks onto the stack. Again you can alter it to exclude certain files and can include other checks such as regexes.

It is fairly simple to adds to this recursive function to allow it to perhaps display the directory name, then all of the files under it and so on (perhaps passing in a number of character indents to indent each subdir across from the main dir or something) etc.

Again this is only if the files arent simply named, and if you want to simply be able to chuck a file in the directory and not worry about renaming it with a number or wish to rename it to something more meaningful to the user.

Wow! How stupid of those manufacturers! Why would they support an OS that 95% of their customers have? They should be thinking about that remaining 5% instead.

Ok, lets just look at this shall we, because this seems to be the main jist of your entire argument.

You mention earlier on that you have no problem with Windows or Windows software such as IE losing their top position if something better (ie technically superior) comes along. How in the hell do you expect them to lose their top spot if all of the hardware manufacturers say "oh no i wont make software for this new OS or software package because it isnt in my 95% demographic".

You've stated MULTIPLE times that "Linux should just make their OS more compatible with this hardware". Are you seriously retarded or something? Do you understand what that entails? Do you know why the companies themselves give drivers rather than Windows supporting everything? It's because the companies keep the inner workings of their hardware a secret and in many countries it can be a felony to actually try and work some of these things out. Reverse Engineering can be done to find out exactly how the hardware works and how to interface with it, allowing makeshift drivers to be written, but this isn't easy and certainly isnt a perfect solution as it doesn't always come out with drivers that support all the features, or that are of the same quality or efficiency as drivers written with prior knowledge of the architecture. Reverse Engineering has been done for a large amount of hardware but as Gaz's link stated it is a long and laborious process and isnt an ideal solution. There is a solution and if you cant be arsed to look around for it then thats your problem. Not all hardware works first time with Windows XP either, in fact is alot of legacy equipment that won't work at all with it anymore (if you remember the XP Compatibility List problems). You slam Linux's compatibility but I havent seen Windows running on PowerPC or Sparc processors or a host of other processors and architectures...... oh wait.. does that mean Windows isn't compatible??

Also, you basically said "why should companies help support an OS that 95% of their consumer base dont use", uh...again, lets look at that from a different direction, wireless cards are common not only in the desktop seen but increasingly in the server and networking scenes where Linux and Unix systems are in the Majority, so how can you actually justify them not helping support it?

Seriously, go do some actual research and actually think about how other systems could gain dominance or could get some market share if everyone thought like you did.

Lastly, you used FreeBSD, this is UNIX not Linux, FreeBSD is a great OS but it may not have everything you want straight out of the box, there are other UNIX distros and there are Linux distros that come with a variety of other software or very little at all depending on your preference. I said to you that you probably wouldn't like the linux experience because you like Windows too much and you dont seem likely to change. All i asked was that you find some respect for Linux, Unix and other operating systems, which you have failed to do because you really didnt give it a chance.

I finally found a link to what I was looking for -

Digital Technium

Hehe, Dak i think alot of that might be because due to the fact it abstains from using the harddrive (so it can promise it didnt alter anything), it uses your RAM like a HD and basically has its whole file system on RAM. This gives some obvious speedups in certain things as HD access times are something like a factor of 1000x slower than memory.

If your talking about FreeBSD and the FreeSBIE live cd, its UNIX or a UNIX variant, not Linux (ie its not based on the Linux Kernel). I know it may sound pedantic, but trust me its for your own safety, if you call FreeBSD Linux in the wrong forum, youll likely end up floating down a river somewhere due to the FreeBSD/UNIX fanatics

http://www.gadgetopia.com/post/2598 might be useful. Havent tried it myself though (use Nero on Laptop and K3b/cdrecord on Desktop).

[Edit]

Gaz beat me to it, sorry for the repost. Could someone please delete it? (Admins)

Klaynos, should still be OK as AMD64 has native x86 compatibility (one of the advantages of it).

I believe that Microsoft has earned its position in the #1 spot. Bill Gates wasn't born a billionaire. Starting Microsoft required a lot of work. Windows did a lot that the competition didn't. That is why Windows became so popular. I'm sure that if another competitor came that was much better than Windows' date=' it would take over the #1 spot.[/quote']

 

ROFL, you REALLY seem to have missed the point. I wasn't saying that Microsoft didnt deserve to be at #1 (which in alot of areas it isnt any longer by the way (check out the server market statistics)), I said that just because it is currently #1 in certain areas, that doesnt mean everything it does is "the standard", if you read what several people have said about the W3C organisation and about various other standards organisation, all of which Microsoft claims to abide by, youd understand what I am saying.

 

Standards are not what one person or company does, no matter their position, they are things that are set down and agreed upon such as the W3C standards. Seriously go read up at W3C.org and go look around at various other web developers blogs and opinions.

 

Your whole argument is based around "IE has the largest market share" therefore "IE is the best". Uh.... that isnt a conclusion that can be drawn. As Klaynos pointed out, it may have originally been the best or at least a very good browser but things can go down hill without a loss in market share. The vast majority of users are happy to have a browser that is sufficient, that does the basics, which IE does. That doesn't make it the better browser. The reason these people use IE is because it comes with Windows, which comes with most desktop PCS.

 

Again there are alot of reasons for this that have nothing to do with Windows competancy as an OS. The main reason this occurs today is marketing, discount deals and a variety of other deals made by microsoft. I don't believe Linux is ready for "the masses" for desktop use, in general but there are a growing number of retailers offering PC's that come with Linux Operating systems instead of Windows. Just because I dont believe it's ready for "the masses", doesnt mean it is useless and it doesnt mean it loses out to Windows in every facet of functionality, and it doesnt mean it doesnt have advantages over Windows, it simply means that there are some features that arent quite as simple or easy to use as Windows, and also alot of people are too scared to try something new.

 

No offense intended, but if your next reply revolves around "Microsoft/IE/Windows is #1, everyone uses it, its therefore the best/good", I won't be replying anymore, as its just a pointless exercise.

Uh... if you go read up, you'll notice that it isn't another browsers feature or standards, these things are part of an agreed upon web standard put out by the W3C organisation which Microsoft claims to support.

Your reasoning in this is completely circular, just because you gain a large market share doesnt mean you gain the right to control the market. As I have said before, go talk to real developers and they will tell you how much trouble IE can give and how it can be such a nuisance to develop for.

Using the logic that because something is big and got big, that is should therefore gain all the advantages and stay big, REALLY doesnt make sense.

Also, not trying to make this personal but you say "computer expert/specialist", I honestly just out of interest would like to know exactly what you mean by this (not intending this as an offense, its just alot of people have varying understandings of the term expert or specialist and what it means in relation to different topics).

Again, you are using the arguement that since IE or Windows is on the majority of computers that obviously it is "the standard". This is ridiculous as i have stated and given reason for. Also, go into any web development forum and you will learn that IE is not "the standard", there are set down standards from organisations such as W3C etc which microsoft have even recognised, saying they conform to it (which for most of it they do in fairness). Microsoft do make some standards (such as the .net standard) and these are good but saying immediately that everything they do is "the standard" because they have made it and a large number of people use it doesn't make it true.

Also, ignoring 28% of your users because they use another browser is insane. Those people might have converted because they feel the other browsers are far better than IE. You are basically saying that IE can be complete rubbish but by doing things differently from everyone else it locks its users into its "standard" and forces users to stick with it because other browsers conform to recognised standards. Also, if you actually go and research it you'll find that alot of browsers do put in fixes so that IE only websites will work. This isn't because the browsers were originally broken, or that they didnt support something, it is because the websites have used non-standards compatible features. There are plenty of features (things such as decent CSS2 support, early CSS3 support, SVG image support) that other browsers support that IE doesnt. Just because IE is sufficient for alot of purposes doesn't make it the better browser.

Hermes3,Ok, first of all, you are REALLY exageratting the number of WINDOWS programs that won't run of Linux. Wine and WineX will run a large number of them, the main problems being games (alot of which WILL run using WineX/Cedega). You seem to think that Windows programs and Windows based games are the only pieces of software that matter. A huge amount of software runs on Linux and Unix systems, including alot of Windows written software and due to the increasing use of .net software along with the development of Mono, you will be seeing alot more of these types of programs.

The fact is the majority of Linux operating systems followed the standards set out by the makers, the problems are that Windows decides to implement things either slightly differently, or adds non standard features that certain games decide to use. This then means that the games wont work on other standardised operating systems as they have utilised the extended or just different functionality in Windows. The point is you are using the fact that Microsoft has become a majority to argue that it should determine the course of the entire software industry and that anything it comes out with is obviously "the standard" which isnt true and certainly shouldnt be as it simply allows them to chop and change "the standard" whenever they like to cripple competition.

You argue that people shouldnt have to code websites in addition to IE. This is complete rubbish from my experiences, I have had to add additional functionality BECAUSE of IE. IE often does things in a completely different way to the standards set out and to other browsers. This causes numerous problems developing interesting sites. Take for example XMLHttpRequest(), IE implements this in an ActiveX Object, which completely cripples the functionality in alot of systems because people turn ActiveX off for security reasons (sometimes advised by microsoft due to a recent bug or exploit). This means not only do I have to add additional checks for IE over other browsers but I also have to implement a fall back setup JUST to be compatible with current modern browsers.

You state that "every problem with IE 6 will be sorted out in IE 7". This MAY be true, although it is certainly not for definite (given the original promises for things such as Longhorn etc and the actual outcome), however that is completely irrelevant. It is like me saying "ok my new ferrari will run just as fast as your 'car x' once I get it upgraded", not only do you have the problem that you are only getting "as good as" the other browsers mentioned in terms of features, you also have the problem that this is a future upgrade, it isnt even here yet so using it as an arguement for the here and now is preposterous.

Lastly I think Klaynos was referring to the fact that there are often processes that simply wont terminate. You can tell a process to stop but whether or not it will die nicely is another thing. There isnt an actual command to KILL a process, only to try and shutdown that process which doesnt always work.

Again, I like Windows, I like Linux, but seriously actually try out both for a reasonable amount of time and get into it a bit. If you give Linux a chance, it has some serious advantages. You probably wouldnt change over to it, and thats fine, but at least you might give it some semblence of respect.

Ok, not getting involved in the flame war but just to clarify hermes3, I havent once had a program crash the entire system, that wasnt in some way recoverable in Linux. This can not be said for my experiences with Windows XP, there have been numerous times when killing a process in the Task Manager simply doesnt work and only serves to crash the task manager as well. There have been very few times when a simple kill command in linux wouldnt do the job and even then there is simply kill -9 which hasnt failed me so far. Despite what Pangloss has said, there are modules for the Linux Kernel, almost everything can be used as a module rather than compiled directly into the Kernel (I am not sure if this is exactly what he meant but figured i'd mention it). I agree, Windows XP has been an improvement over Windows 98 in terms of stability but saying "I suppose Linux had the same problem" isnt really fair as you havent tested that assumption. I'm not saying Linux in general is better than Windows XP, they each have their advantages but you saying that Windows XP is the clear winner and is obviously the most stable OS around and that Linux obviously has a host of problems and that it doesn't include half the functionality available in Windows XP are just empty arguments, you havent backed them up with any proof, you havent offered any form of evidence other than your own words.

You mention that Windows is just as easily customisable as Linux operating systems, this is true to a certain degree, but the fact is Linux is completely and utterly customisable for the advanced user, there is no aspect of it you cant change because all of the core code is open source (this isnt an open source rant as I dont hate proprietary software, simply stating a point). The fact that you can change things within the kernel and remove unnecessary components that arent needed for your system is one aspect (the windows kernel does include alot of added components for compatibility) that is advantageous, the fact that you can not only change the underlying look and feel but also the inner workings of the system is part of the high degree of customisation available. You dont like that Desktop Manager, change it, you dont like that X server, change it, write your own, get someone else to start the project, whatever. You don't like the file system, change it, you dont like the numerous sections of various aspects of the file system. Change it. I'm not saying alot of this can't be done with Windows XP but I am saying that I believe you can do it to a much higher degree in Linux and Unix systems.

Again I'm not saying that Windows XP is worse than Linux, I'm not saying Linux is worse than Windows XP, I'm simply saying that both have their feature sets, and both have advantages, and to be honest I think you are seriously overexagerating alot of the faults and even percieved faults in Linux operating systems.

Ok, my understanding of this is minimal but just a question -

As the CubbyWatcher threads have been created, they are running away in the background quite happily, and then you create the CubbyFiller thread/object which in the example your referring to almost immediately "puts" the value. As the value has been "put()", "available" for that CubbyFillers CubbyHole has been set to true and "notifyAll()" has been run so the "wait()" will trip out and if we are for instance talking about the 1st CubbyFiller/Hole, then the first CubbyWatcher's "get()" will finally work and it will output. So it looks to me anyways that CubbyWatcher's wouldn't have to be after all the CubbyFiller output, only after their specific CubbyFiller output and in theory if the processing for the CubbyWatcher was small enough and the job management worked out nicely you could in theory end up with -

CubbyWatcher
CubbyWatcher
CubbyWatcher
CubbyWatcher
CubbyWatcher
CubbyWatcher
CubbyFiller, item = aaa
Watcher #1 got: aaa
CubbyFiller, item = bbb
Watcher #2 got: bbb
CubbyFiller, item = ccc
Watcher #3 got: ccc
CubbyFiller, item = ddd
Watcher #4 got: ddd
CubbyFiller, item = eee
Watcher #5 got: eee

But as the CubbyWatcher processing takes some time, 2 more (in the example you showed) CubbyFillers and therefore CubbyHoles have been created. So if it takes roughly 2 CubbyFiller creation "times" to finalise the CubbyWatchers output, the next CubbyWatcher comes out after "e" which it does in this example. I would draw a diagram to show what I mean but i can't draw diagrams to save my life.

At least thats the way it seems to me but you probably know far more about this than me (ive only played about with threads and never really done much with them) and I may be grossly misunderstanding what is going on. Those are just my 2 cents and my question to you is, does what I am saying make sense to you from what youve been doing?

Server PC - Gentoo

Desktop - Gentoo (with Win XP on another hd which doesnt get used at all anymore)

Laptop - Windows XP

To Dak -

Sure, depends on what distro you use but most of them have package management systems that allow you to search and download various programs or updates to various parts of the system. Alot of stuff can be edited by hand using config files but there are numerous programs that will provide a GUI interface for this.

I have to agree with Pangloss to some extent and Dak to some extent.

Let me just say, I love linux, i use it for my default desktop OS (Gentoo) and for a little server pc (Gentoo again) i run and I completely disagree with herme3, who said Linux lacks features. This is completely wrong in my opinion, yes, Windows XP or Mac OS X have features that Linux doesnt, just as Mac OS X has features that Windows XP doesnt and vice versa, but you have to understand that linux itself also has features that neither of the other two (or other OS's) have. I think herme3 made the statement with little research into the matter (no offense intended).

That being said, I do get very annoyed by the fanboy attitude and zealotry found in some areas, not just in linux but in other OS's too (yes there are Windows fanboys, Mac fan boys etc). These guys will slam other OS's to make theirs seem better, will overlook advantages in other OS's and tout up the advantages of their pet OS. Windows may have its problems, but so does any OS, and it does have its advantages (compatibility, ease of use, a large company backing it that can easily be held accountable for failures etc). Windows has its faults, Linux has its faults, Unix has its faults, Mac OS X/9/8/? have had their faults. No-one is perfect and no-one forces you to use any of them. In my opinion, use whatever suits you and whatever is best for a particular job. Sure compare OS's for that particular job, but don't slam another OS because you have found yours to be better than the other in your opinion for your uses. Others will use the best tool for the job in their opinion and for their uses, their opinion and advantages etc are what counts.

--------------------------------

yourdadonapogos,it looks like you want to use Linux purely because it isn't Microsoft made. That's your choice and you have your reasons. Have you considered Unix distros such as FreeBSD, OpenBSD and a plethora of others (google Unix)?

Id say the main pro of linux in general (not of one specific distro) is openness. If you are a fiddler or a tinkerer, and you are willing to learn a thing or two, you can easily adjust your environment to your needs very easily and edit and change programs or ... anything to what you want. This can be said of windows in some cases, but the open source nature of linux, in my opinion means this is much easier. There are other things such as increased stability in some cases, increased security in others but these can all be argued to kingdom come amongst Windows and Linux groups alike and to be honest, alot of the time its down to the user whether or not a system is secure (although the default settings in the majority of linux distros is considered by alot of people to be more secure, which is a plus). The con of using linux is pretty simple - you'll have to learn a new way of doing things. Easy as that. Sure some will argue its harder, some will argue its more complicated and you can't do X or Y. If you are willing to search around and do a bit of homework, you can usually find a way (the fact that you have to find a way may be a con but I its not something that is much of an inconvenience considering there are things you much overcome in any OS).

So why upgrade?

Probably because you won't have much choice . They'll remove support for Windows XP at some point, they'll release more and more patches for Longhorn, ensure that most of the newest features etc are things you can't live without so that you have to shell out for it

Hehe, thats my guess anyways.