damn bracket, remove it at the end of the url. The download link on that page works.

I don't know about you guys, but the link in the article (http://www.microsoft.com/ntserver/nts/downloads/winfeatures/rras/rrasdown.asp)
where u can download rras seems to work.

Originally Posted by lonelyatthetop
Ya\'ll must be livin\' in a different world than I.

I regularly (that is, yearly) spend big bucks on licensing for software development tools (UML tools, configuration management tools, developer licensing, \'runtime licenses\', problem tracking tools, help desk software), servers and databases on Sun/Solaris platforms.

Welcome to America.

mac_bug - Yep. I was only pointing out that, for my purposes, the GPL is superior. I chose the GPL over the BSD license specifically because MS or Intel or AMD or whoever can never take over my code and use it to their profit. That's all.

Originally Posted by mac_bug
why does everyone think it has to be linux vs. ms, like linux\'s ultimate goal is revenge on bill gates or something?

BSD or GPL is couple of many choices. When the author choses BSD, they KNOWINGLY allows ANYONE, INCLUDING MS to use their work however they like.

ya it was me, I never said BSD blows!. From what I've heard its a little better than Linux in some things. I never used BSD. Its the licence that I odject to. If BSD was licensed under some form that prevented M$ from coopting it, that license I would have no problem with. As far as I know only the GPL will prevent M$ from stealing "the show". Please understand that over these years I have lived with DOS, win31., win95, win98, and all sucked compared to OS/2 (which I loved). I know a good OS from a bad one, and I'm sure BSD is tops.

My loathing for M$ at this point is so much that even if M$ did release a technically pure and awesume version of BSD, I'll have no part of it. I refuse to give any more money to M$ - whether their product eventually merits it or not. I see BSD as something M$ can and will control and reissue in their name. (this is what Apple did to a degree). Only Linux can win this war.

Originally Posted by davvar
Hey Forge,

I\'m just sick of the Linux rulez everything else blows line.

If you want to license your stuff under the GPL, fine. Just don\'t tell me I\'m the spawn of Bill if I don\'t (although I\'m not too worried about Microsoft coopting my puny bash scripts).

PS it was AG 77

AG #54 - "linux-on-the-desktop is just for [people] that don't want bigbrother running the show on their computer."

Shit, man, you *DO* want Big Brother running your computer? I know I don't, and I don't know anyone who really does. Even clueless lusers who want no decisions to make don't want some faceless corporation, or worse, a corp after their pocketbook, making their decisions. They want someone they can trust to have their best interests in mind, and MS isn't, and may never be, that person.

Please help me find whoever started the BSD vs. GPL sub-thread so I can have him/her caned.

I release all code I author under the GPL. I don't mind people using it for anything, I just don't want to see it quietly folded into some mega-corporation's product without me getting notice or compensation.

If I were to code in a work-related manner, I'd be writing under a custom EULA or maybe the BSD license, with all rights given to the parent corp. As it is, that code is 100% mine, and I don't want anyone but me making a buck off it.

That's just my .02$, think about it what you'd like.

Originally Posted by davvar
\"dawar - with respect, BSD is too free\"

Riiggghht... I keep on hearing the same old song and dance, \"Just give up your freedom and I\'ll give you this nice tasty cookie!\"

I see the purpose behind the GPL and I think the intentions are well founded. Hell if the rumors of a Debian BSD ever came to frution I\'d give it a shot. My problem with your argument is that you seem to think that any license but the one of your choosing is bad. Some GPL zealots take the \"Your with us or against us!\" road. I\'m a little too mellow for that.

There was an excellent bit by ESR on this same topic, but I can\'t find it.

\"Think Joe Ave, not PC-hobbyist here\" As far as that goes screw Joe Average. The big problem is with corporate licensing of MS software. Coporate purchases are made by people paid to know better (Whether they do or not is another matter).

and finally it\'s spelled with two v\'s not one w

dawar - with respect, BSD is too free to be able to fight M$. Beleive it or not, people will buy 'WindowBSD" over any free BSD alternative. Just as they are with MacOS-X.

Do you honestly beleive that just becuase the source code of BSD is sittng on the net somewhere, folks will use that over the "official certified M$ version". Think Joe Ave, not PC-hobbyist here. The BSD licence is not effective in fighting M$ (in fact it will only help M$, buy have "free employees writing code for M$'s next version of windows"

I wrote GNU below (meant GPL - sorry). BSD is not an enemy by virtue of its technical merit (it IS the enemy due soley by its open licence (which will only help M$)).

So to be blunt BSD is the other enemy, because it adoption will help M$ strengthen its stronghold.

If you can't see the potential and "free lunch" BSD is for M$ your not sceptical enough.

Originally Posted by davvar
Riiigght! more BSD vs GPL license crap.

When you come right down to it BSD and GPL licensed software both undermine Microsoft. GPL software is just faster and more overt.

Yes MS can just steal/incorporate BSD software into their own stuff. MS can\'t remove BSD from the market though. It is still freely available for anyone. As BSD improves in quality and features more people try it (and like it). The BSD\'s may not be the new hot thing like Linux, but they are doing quite well.

MS \"stole\" their TCP/IP stack from BSD. Apple also \"stole\" a bunch of code from BSD to make OS X. Eventually people start to put 2 and 2 together and go right to the source. Why pay for the Microsoft or Apple OS when the OS they based their code on is free?

Linux vs BSD is stupid when the real opponent is MS

[q]
MS is not going to make Real Player or Quicktime go away simply by pushing their Media Player.
[/q]
Me again, still harping on this. There is a post at ZDnet

http://makeashorterlink.com/?Q30B2301

talking about how some recording companies are putting out CDs with WMA files on them. As they point out,

[q]
MP3's lead could change quickly, however, if CDs are routinely released with easily accessible Windows Media versions of songs onboard.
[/q]

MacBug (77/78 here) - OK what you say is true from the programmers perspective!. I'm not talking about that. i'm talking about from the end-user's perspective.

Rightly, you say: GNU restricts the programer, whereas BSD is real opensource - true WRT programmers.

I say (WRT end users) - Who cares if programers are free under BSD licence if this same license allows M$ to steal code and continue to force us as users to use yet another "windows" (BSD based this time). The market remains closed (due to the huge resources which M$ has) and M$ centric. GNU through its restrictions upon programers ensures that M$ cant copy/steal code and although limits the programmers freedom - guarantees the PC-user a choice other than M$ and thus ensures a "Free" market and freedom.

Do I make sense here? - I think I do.

#80 mac_bug: Maybe I am real dum, but your post seems incoherent.

Originally Posted by mac_bug
77, maybe you should check your definition of free, BSD HAS NO RESTRICTIONS, where as GNU only lends itself by forcing programmers to release their modified source codes. If you want to talk about true freedom, giving people a choice and letting them decide whether they want to release their source code is way the heck better than being forced to, even though you are going to do it anyway. If GNU didn\'t exist (stallman was all about free software for all), would Linux still exist? Maybe, maybe not, after all, if Torvalds heard of BSD before he set out to do his own pet project, he won\'t be a techie household name. As for this whole concept of open source and sharing of code, if under BSD license it doesn\'t flourish and under GNU it does, I guess that just says most programmers would rather not release the new codes if they had a choice. Freedom? Of course that doesn\'t take away from the author\'s right to chose which license they wish to release their product on, and yes, should MS choose to make their own version of BSD, they have just as much right to do so as you. Yadayada, another can of worms here.

72: You know, as innovative as Microsoft claims to be, they are just stealing proven ideas from other companies, and mandating the use of their own buggy version.


forgive me, but I thought linux and open source was about sharing of ideas. ANd last time I checked, MS still get a nice round of bashing if they try to prevent anyone from copying what they copied from someone else. Hypocritical on both ends?

70: Um, you DO have a concept of the difference between hardware and software, and whats involved in their makings, right?

btw #62? seeing as how that article was written in 1995, maybe a more recent source would be more benefitial, I can start quoting how IBM tried to squash competition 10 years ago too and try to tell you it still applies.

#77 Get a grip, all I was doing was mocking poster #54's
comment. ;^D #60

#62 - frontpage also uses proprietary HTML tags which will not work under Opera/Netscape/(and others I assume).

I started to write my homepage under it back in 1998, and checked the site under the above mentioned browsers (no midi autoloading, and various other faulity partial loading). I stopped using frontpage, got a HTML book, and rewrote my website under notepad - now the other browser work fine.

Don't use frontpage folks ;-(

Poster#60 - free market blah blah blah - just how "Free" is the market? how "free" would it be without the GNU license? and how "free" without the internet?

No interent = no Linux (free market was not an issue here)

No GNU = only BSD (which M$ can take and make into "windosBSD" legally = hense windows orever and ever

Nope - the "free" market is not relivant to Linux's success (consult BeOS for the merits of the so-called "Free" market), Linux is here due to 1.) the Internet (which allows opensource code collaboration and free distribution of the OS) 2. The GNU license - which prevents M$ from buying-out, killing, embracing and extinguishing, etc...

Those two things are the reasons for M$'s fear. There never was a free market (maybe in the mid 80's).

Originally Posted by ---k
Good post 62

After the BSA postcards our small company began the switch to
Star Office. We are very happy with it and have no problems
reading and writing word and powerpoint files.
StarOffice has the added advantage that it works on Linux as
well as under windows so we are not trapped with a MS operating
system

I haven't read all the comments, and I don't really want to. I'm just going to quietly repeat what I've been chanting for almost two years:
Linux makes you free....
---------
....and irritable.

Microsoft's worst enemy? Steve Balmer. All this idiocy started when Gates stepped down and left Balmer have the reigns.

Speaking of alternatives.... Did Forge and ALW ever publish their Linux articles?

Shame on you #53! You obviously don't understand the facts.
Try reading this article: http://www.zdnet.com/eweek/stories/general/0,11011,2815186,00.html
It pretty much says how Microsoft plans to control how you compute, and how you don't have a choice, through their voice.

Then try reading the EULA for Microsoft Media Player.
In it you will find that the license agreement for Windows Media Player now allows Microsoft to disable any software on your computer. Want to switch to a competior? I don't think so.

Wanna try Linux? If you ever browse Microsoft's own newsgroups, you will find that Linux users have found that XP has a strange tendency to turn ext2 partitions into cache space. For those who don't know, ext2 is the default filesystem for Linux. So, in effect, XP writes over GNU/Linux.

Look at what this does for the PC economy! Microsoft is phasing out third party software, and who knows, pehaps even competitive hardware like pointing devices and joysticks/game pads. Novell sold file and printsharing. Then came NT and Windows for Workgroups. Netscape sold web browsers. Then
came IE/Windows integration. Nullsoft (now AOL btw) gave mp3 players. Hello Media Player 7. You know, as innovative as Microsoft claims to be, they are just stealing proven ideas from other companies, and mandating the use of their own buggy version.

But of course, you are a Troll. You don't look at the facts.

We are Microsoft. We are Borg. Resistance is futile.

Linux? Servers? Yes. Linux? Average home user? No.
---------
Now here's a guy with his head screwed on straight.

"they will realize that they are charging way too much for their products....then they can start by lowering their prices. "

=> HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA

You think they will lower their prices?

From what I've seen so far, only HARDWARE companies
lower their prices of what was originally planned.
Unlike MS, some companies do listen to the consumer.

Don't you know what Bill's plan is?
TOTAL DOMINATION.

Do you know how much the US's N.S.A. spent on
taxpayers money in "hardening" their Win2k-based
systems?

And another thought, this time concerning "Pffft, you think?" and the results of MS's "encouragement".

Piracy / theft has become socially acceptable, and that sucks. MS does what it can to prevent what they see as lost sales. If you pirate it, you're certainly not buying it. How do you think Product Registration came about? (And people bemoan Product Registration, too. We could blame the pirates... but does anyone really want to pay those fees? At how much?)

The best thing that I can hope for out of this is that when MS tries to validate every user (and therefore get better, more accurate statistics that will probably fit into some supply/demand curve somewhere) they will realize that they are charging way too much for their products, and that the majority of build-it yourselfers would rather continue to pirate their old software than buy new. (Or continue to use old software... Or wait for the price of the new stuff to go down as it always does... Or use competitor products instead... It looks like MS will be very successful in "encouraging" their potential customers to use the competition from what I can tell.)

If MS really wants to increase their profit margin while providing the latest technology to the masses, then they can start by lowering their prices. (If the average user doesn't see a need to upgrade to XP HOME, then why would your average business owner / purchaser want to spend $200 - $300 for XP Professional? Per computer? Ouch!)

I like the Compaq plan for upgrading their i-PAQ PDAs to Pocket PC 2002... Sounds like they're aiming for the $30 mark. I could see paying $50-$60 for a new home OS upgrade - I'd spend that on a good top selling video game.

(Concerning Netscape): Sure - MS was a contributing factor to Netscape's demise - a rather large contributing factor. Netscape just didn't diversify and establish strong partnerships. (At least as I remember it.) If I could roll back the clock, take a look at their financial status, see what technology was available at the time, get a feel for what everyone else was doing, do the whole SWOT analysis, I can probably bring up a few things that they could have done differently - but hindsight is always 20/20, right?

[And I still find Netscape Communicator being used a lot. (Cuz 6.0 and 6.1 stinks.) That's what I use under X-Windows. How about you?]

Welcome to the world of business... We like to think that bribing as a way of doing business is something that disreputable non-American countries do as a way of business, and that is 100% wrong. It's human nature, and American companies will continue to find ways to "encourage" your money from your wallet just as easily as currency greases the palms of decision makers in other lands. You don't think that a "sale" or a "discount" isn't a bribe?

Another horrid mis-use of power case in point:

Intel is deep in bed with Rambus. They're promoting Rambus memory like nobody's business, and rumor has it that they'll get some type of profit incentive to do so. With the 845 chipset, they have the technology to use competitive DDR memory, but they want to wait a little longer... supposedly to meet the profit incentive requirements with Rambus.

Meanwhile, VIA reverse-engineers a bunch of things and offers a chipset that will let a P4 work with DDR. In beating Intel to market, they'll stand to make a substantial gain since the initial price of a new good or service is typically highest when it is first introduced. Think Intel wants to loose that profit to its competitors?

Think again, Intel threatens VIA with a lawsuit, and we have yet to see any motherboards with VIA's new chipset as a result. Is it unethical? To who? Certainly not to anyone who has invested in Intel stocks. Was there a payoff? Nope. Intel probably wouldn't even win that one in court - that's not the point. VIA doesn't have the resources for a war on that front, and they both know it.

If I were VIA, I'd stand resistant, bite my tongue, continue R&D on that chipset, add some additional features to make it more enticing, and then reveal my ace when Intel finally goes to market with their version... hoping to have a far superior product because I wasn't lazy. (And if I can't produce the DDR technology at all without loosing a lot of blood, then I can add those features to my existing and future product lines.)

...and while we can all bemoan that this is an unfair tactic, Intel will more than likely get away with it. If I were MS, and I wanted to get more sales, would I discontinue current plans as an incentive to switch and use some other tactics? You betcha!

(Oh, and if you ever wanted an incentive to upgrade from Office 97, all you have to do is compare the stability and reliability of Outlook 97 when compared to Outlook 98 or better - don't even bring up script virus complaints, I'm talking about things like telling me that I'm out of hard drive space when I'm not, freaking out with blank e-mail header fields, or having date issues with the e-mail header information.)

Originally Posted by mac_bug
j. langner : how does it feel to get burned :)

Andy Brown said:
"Microsoft's tactics have caused the occasional grumble before, usually among competitors, much less frequently among consumers. "

Is that why everyone hates them so universally? Get real.

Now, they've topped off all their arrogance and theft (made possible by their monopoly) by buying out the Feds.