great comparison. i come across these comments many times. don't know why people love mr. gates that much!!!

That's about it.

I had an exchange with someone on slashdot recently where they complained about the performance of OO.o Calc when creating a simple line graph for 2048 data pairs.

I was curious so I tried it and saw they were right -- it was abysmal compared to Excel. I then tried Gnumeric and saw it could handle it just as fast and nice as Excel.

I pointed this out, mentioning that I thought Excel was a great app but that I valued freedom more. Gnumeric is a mature program and it shouldn't be a big deal to use it for larger and more complicated operations.

So what part of my response does this guy pick up on? The part about freedom. He said he didn't see how Excel was limiting his freedom. I resisted the urge to respond. What could I say?

haha its excellent, good comparison!

Well, that may be... but you must admit that there can be very many legitimate criticisms of linux. DENIS.

Linux is great, but there is still room for improvement.

Windows is great, but there is still room for improvement. TROLL.

Ha, all very true! Let's not forget ...

11) Security
a) Linux: Sudo? Gksudo? Root? What?
b) Windows (pre-XP): Why shouldn't everyone be an administrator? It's soooo convenient! Besides, none of your programs will run otherwise ...
c) Windows (XP): Why shouldn't everyone be an administrator? Sure you can right-click and "run as" administrator, but that hardly ever works properly. Besides, none of your programs will run otherwise ...
d) Windows (Vista): Now you can run as a limited user and enter your password to do administrative tasks! Isn't this new, innovative feature wonderful?

"you must admit that there can be very many legitimate criticisms of Linux."

And I do! I have no problem with a legitimate criticism of any system. Exploring my reviews section will uncover where I've taken exception to the shortcomings of a distro on several occasions.

I took the liberty to translate it to Spanish and posted it in my blog. It's a great read, I hope you don't mind.

@Cesar: I don't mind - in fact, I linked it!

windows *is* easier in some respects for some people (meaning myself), but with this post you're 100 % right.

thanks for pointing out the situation so clearly. glad to have found your site (via your distrowatch-comment).

We were previous Windows users for our business. After a virus completely wiped out our hard drive, we spent a whole weekend putting our info back in so we could get our classified ad paper out. I was sick & tired of the crashes, spyware & the rest of the crap that comes with Windows. Our friend had suggested a little while before that we switch to Linux. After our big crash, he came over immediatley & switched us to Linux. That was about 4yr ago and we have never looked back. From a business point of view, Linux is more productive, efficient and you get more done without the crashes, viruses, or popups appearing on your system. Love it!

"don't know why people love mr. gates that much!!!"

His company is part of their 401K plan. End of story.

~chuckle~ well done Penguin Pete, the humourous approach might be more effective than the educational approach of the Linux != Windows page.
just in case you haven't seen it:
http://linux.oneandoneis2.org/LNW.htm

~wandering to your reviews area to see if you have the same opinion of the disabled root account stupidity of a certain family of distros~

Damnit -- you're all just linux fanboys. The writer, the commenter, even the for the comments that I haven't read.

Linux: Look at all the great free programs that come with my distro!
Windows: How dare they put IE or Media Player with Windows! That is just killing the competition!

K:

• That's the point of having several distros: they all come with different programs. All Windows versions come with IE and Media Player (or no player at all).
• Every distro I've used came with several web browsers, audio/video players and text editors. Except maybe Damn Small Linux.
• You can easily replace a program. Two lines of apt-get on my Debian. You can't remove IE from Windows (actually you can, but it's hard and likely to break a dozen of other programs).
• Don't want a distro with "great free programs"? Use Linux From Scratch!
• Distros intended (mainly) as LiveCD must show what Linux has to offer, and they won't do that with just a kernel and a text editor. This is not true for distros without LiveCD, and Windows.

RiRi: Exactly. But how comes I find hundreds of Linux fanboys everywhere someone talks about Linux, and I've met only one Windows fanboy so far, although there are much more Windows users than Linux users?

I am a windows zealot, but I have a perspective most windows users dont have, my windows works! Ohh yes, 4 years with the same original XP Pro install I put on and it's running quickly and virus-free. I know this isn't everyones experience, but this is kind of the point the article makes.

Experienced linux users no doubt run there installs like well oiled machines, I am not an experienced linux user and had no end of problems with getting stuff to work. I know I was to blame, but to a user not experienced in computers it would appear linux is buggy and slow(If they went through what I did).

Move over to windows, and you have the exact same reaction from people, "I have a problem, therefore windows is to blame". It's sometimes right, but more often than not it's not windows fault.

How many of you linux programmers could write a linux program right now that when downloaded and run would completely bugger up an ubuntu install? The fact none of you do is a testiment to the huge loyalty and expertise your OS attracts, but the fact is you could do it, you just dont. Wait till everyone moves to linux and JoPublic starts writing applications and buggering up peoples installs.

@K:

LOL! OK, you have raised a point. The difference is, Linux is given away for free and so are the GPL programs that run on Linux. Hence, no attempt to corner a market for profit.

Also, if MS released IE under a GPL-compatible license and ported it to Linux, I'm sure a distro somewhere would have no problem releasing it alongside Firefox, Konqueror, and the rest. Web developers, for instance, would like a copy to test web pages under.

Windows FanBoy [Visitor]: It really would be a pain to have a virus that could hurt a Linux install. The only way would likely be to trick a user into doing something that would install it... such as false advertising of software. However, I suppose there could be a way to get something taken over... but usually no more than the user they're logged in as. You couldn't ever infect the whole system without the root password that I know of.

Maybe I am being a stupid fanboy too, sorry if I am. I try to make it a bit harder for hackers with my machine anyway by denying ssh to most hosts, keeping a seperate user to su into for my files, having different users for each Internet application, and being logged in as another. I also have all the data backed up to my external hard drive every night, and I turn it off when not in use.

See, Linux isn't that bad. Trust me, it's an excellent operating system with several pros, one of which is that it is completely free.

Saying that, I still think Windows is more ideal for me. I say this because I know how to handle it, what to do and what not to. Ok, let me give you an example:

I browse to my site of choice and look around a little bit when I suddenly come across this flashy advertisement. It says, "Free smilies. Download ------ Toolbar.", or some shit like that. Now normally I don't like toolbars. But if it happened to be software of some kind, I'd first Google it, search for any cases of spyware, adware and virus infection.

Then if it interests me, download it.

Pretty simple.

Seriously, there is a reason that Windows dominates the computer market with a market share of over 90%.

The reason is that if used correctly, it can be unbeatable.

Windows has a lot LOT more third party applications. Most open source software also comes with a Windows build. A lot of commercial software is there for it too. Being a designer myself, and also at one point of time using both GIMP and Photoshop, I've found that Photoshop just blows GIMP away in terms of resources. A search in Google for 'Photoshop Tutorials' gave me more than twenty five MILLION results
The same for GIMP gave me about 1.7 million. (one million six hundred seventy thousand to be precise)
Which is a lot, bear in mind, but it's several million less than what's there for Photoshop.

Ok, true, several million less, but thats still a lot, one million is a huge huge amount but there are so many other aspects to it. I am not talking about graphic software alone. I just used that as an example.

There is so much more behind it! Games for instance. Clearly the Windows operating system takes the cake.

Getting back on subject, I want to emphasize that Linux is a very very VERY versatile system. It can be changed to people's needs, altered, modified and extended. There is one problem. There is no set standard. True, Windows may have several different operating systems. But also note that a program designed to work in Windows 98 will MOST probably work on the later versions of Windows.

Now, though I prefer Windows as an operating system, I don't endorse many of Microsoft products. I use a LOT of open source software. Believe me, I can not do anything without open source. I love Firefox, I love VLC, I love so many other things as well. The thing about me is, I don't go by the hype. I go by the practicality of things.
I use Windows because it has very very developed third party resources: Most of the software on the internet is made for Windows.

I use Firefox since, it's by-far the best browser to hit the planet.

I use VLC since it's rock-solid when it comes to performance light on and RAM usage.

I use MSN since most of my friends are users of it. Therefore I don't need multi-service messengers. Although I do use Pidgin or some web messaging client when it comes to slower PCs.

Now we are all ignoring the Mac. Which is a good thing. As a Mac has pathetic third party resources, is over-rated, over priced and in general, hopeless.

Macs are for people who don't understand computers. If a person is capable of crashing their PC right after they install Windows, they're better off using a Mac anyway, although I would recommend Linux ;)

Also, for a price of a Mac, iPod or any other useless, elitist, piece of crap that Apple spews out most of the time, I can get something twice as powerful and make it look ten times as cool without voiding the warranty!

So there seems to be a clear line drawn between the three operating systems.

Linux is a very versatile environment, It has loads of developers and can be tailored to ones needs. Most of the time it doesn't need to. The problem is, lack of market share and universal compatibility. Which according to me is a great tragedy.

Windows is more for the mix of commercial and open source projects. This is why so many people are using Windows. It has several commercial software companies and also loads and loads of freeware which makes everyone's life a little better!

and OSX on a MAC which is possibly thw worst type of system to come out in years. Its for the people who:
a) have no other way to spend their money

b) for people who think shiny things work better.

c) for people who can't understand what a computer's potential is.

and
d) for people who are ignorant to the world around them.

With this, I conclude my long entry. Please note that I have made every effort to make this a neutral text. Except when it comes to Macs, that is...

I go by what i think is useful and resourceful for me. I'm not blinded by the hype, though I check it out too.

Adios, and no disrespect to Mac junkies :)

Oh, the humanity... maybe my life would have been more productive if I'd chosen the path of the stoner wino.

I couldn't stop laughing when I read it. Bravo. Here's another one:

Windows: Awesome! Flip3D and Aero look fantastic! And look at the taskbar, little previews!

GNU/Linux: What? Compiz? Who needs fancy eyecandy and window management features like that "scale" plugin. People don't need 3D effects on the desktop.

Getting back on subject, I want to emphasize that Linux is a very very VERY versatile system. It can be changed to people's needs, altered, modified and extended. There is one problem. There is no set standard. True, Windows may have several different operating systems. But also note that a program designed to work in Windows 98 will MOST probably work on the later versions of Windows.


Are you joking?!? Seriously? I just had to deal with this crap (again) a few years ago with ZoomText version 7.0...this wonderful compatibility you're lying about required us to upgrade to version 8.0...and after we upgraded our corporate desktops to Windows XP SP2 we had to upgrade to ZoomText version 9.0...this is just one puny example not counting all the super-duper virus scanners out there that were also upgraded. At home I now wonder if I should crack open my copy of Monkey Island 2, Wing Commander 3, or Heroes of Might and Magic II from back in the days when I used to run Windows and see just how well they run on Vista! Any bets?

...now consider that with the "non-standardized" Linux all programs made for older versions run on newer versions thanks to compatiblity layers that are usually provided (oss emulation module, iptables compatible ipchains/ipfwadm modules, and devfs-compatibility scripts come immediately to mind) and most programs made for newer versions will run on older versions!
Here's your quote of the day:
Microsoft - We put the "backwards" in backwards-compatible

Yet another one:
Windows: Oh you can't run that it's made for Windows XP and you have 98! Didn't you check the system requirements?!?
Linux: I have to edit a text file to make this work?!? Why!?! This Linux is so nonstandardized!!

I've made mention of this in my latest article

WTF? I can't even get Outlook 2007 to work on Vista, and that is a Microsoft product.

Great post. Sad to see the Windows proselyte in this section attempting to sow some FUD.
Linux is for power users, Windows is for n00bs.

Pst: latest OpenSolaris runs the same binaries from about 1995, unchanged.

#2- The problem isn't that Linux distros HAVE a command line, it's that it's near impossible to get a good deal of stuff done without going to the command line, and cryptic unix commands and flags (that of course no one tells you the meaning of when you look in a BB post) do not an easy time make.

#3- It isn't that easy on Linux and you know it. I just did a locate on a file that I knew was there (I was looking right at it) and it didn't find it.

#4- Are you saying people LIKE the fact that Windows stratifies it's OS into 7 different options? I've never ran across anyone who likes distinguishing between 7 different flavors of Windows.

#6- Unfortunately, as much as I hate Windows, the plain fact of the matter is that it is a lot easier to figure out how things work in it. Linux is great and all, but I'd never recommend it to anyone who wasn't prepared for a year-long training period. Editing config files, looking up man pages, cryptic ugly documentation that was obviously written as an afterthought, etc, etc.

#7- I've never heard anyone say this.

"Linux is for power users, Windows is for n00bs."

And that's just my point. Thank you. Now can we stop pretending like Linux is for everyone and anyone using Windows is just a whining double-standard-having fanboy?

Yet another:

Linux - install, run, play, work......

Vista - install, run, load drivers, update drivers, install service pack, more updates.....

.....

Okay, I'll be serious now. Despite the initial headaches of setting up Windows, it does tend to work well, but I've always found that for some reason, this is not something that lasts. On at least 4 occasions the critical updates have left me with a dead system that had me reaching for the installation disk to do a repair.

Now Ubuntu Linux - there's a different story altogether. It installed, it works, and just keeps going - faultlessly. On my x64 system the hardware is running great, due to the fact that the drivers are freely available (not so in Vista), and it runs about 30% faster too. All this from something that is totally and 100% free!

I won't take a cheap shot at Windows because it serves it purpose, and so many people are happy with its performance. But I will say that Linux is the way forward - it is so progressive, despite it's fairly steep learning curve after using Windows for many years, and it can only get better in time.

As a footnote, I'll add that most Windows programs will run great under Linux using Wine, and even Windows itself runs well in VirtualBox.... so why not give it a try and break the monopoly!

I am a systems admin for a smaller corporate network. All of our desktops run windows xp. I think Windows is a great OS. However it can't compare to linux. Linux is no longer the os people think. In ubuntu you NEVER HAVE to use the shell, although you can. In response to itsjustaride; yes it is that easy. In fact with using wine or crossover linux I have IE6, windows media 9, Tomb-raider, WoW, and Photoshop all installed. However I did pay $50 for crossover. All of the OSes out there now are good, but most distos of linux are by far and away better than windows or mac.