/me posting this using Linux

[fuuucckkers]

But I didn't like the way the file system is organized,

Agreed. But that's only because I'm so used to how the Windows file systems are set up. Programs go together in program files, system files are in Windows (or Winnt). It's very organized.

I suppose the *nix file systems are organized in their own fashion... just very differently than Windows.

It'll just take some getting used to, and to figure out where the files go when their installed and all that stuff.

[stevec]

does linux still uses arrows and the point and click stuff???? what is it gui like

Does it use arrows and point-and-click? It can.

What is the gui like? It depends.

You can opt to use a gui or just use a console. Using the gui you get point-and-click type stuff similar to Windows. As people have already said, it can look like Windows (or Mac, for that matter), it can also look very, very different. With Linux, you have the option of using multiple and various guis. The most popular are KDE and Gnome, which are Windows-like. I could go on about this some more, but that's the basics.

Well, for one thing, on Linux, a lot of software comes only as source code and you need to compile it, which is a pain in the ass. (On Mac OS X, most code comes as the app and the source code, so you still get the source code without having to compile anything.) You also have weird issues with permissions, especially when using floppy disks. I've found on some Linux systems you have to be logged in as root to copy anything to a floppy drive. Also, at least on Red Hat, applications can be stored in some places, and you get a lot of redundant apps. I've also had trouble emailing from Linux systems, in that I send an email and it is not delivered for another 12-24 hours. I've also had numerous issues connecting to FTP servers, which I don't have in Mac OS X. I used Linux for a while and I still do a bit, but I like OS X a lot more because it looks better, is organized better, and is a robust Unix OS without all the compatibility issues and "quirky" problems of Linux.

Really? I was unaware that any apps for OS X came with source unless they were ported from Linux apps.

Compiling from source really isn't that much of a pain unless it's a huge application (such as KDE) or you're on a slow computer. Most *nix users prefer it because then the application is optimized for your computer and will run faster than a precompiled binary.

Personally, at least 80% of the Linux apps I've seen (and that's a conservative estimate) offer a binary download as well as a source download. The RPM and DEB files you'll frequently see are auto-installing binaries. Furthermore, I'm pretty sure Linux distributions such as Red Hat, Mandrake, and Lindows all offer package managers that allow you to go through a software repository and select any packages you'd like to install. I also happen to feel that Debian's apt system (which has been spread to other systems) is one of the best installation systems there is. I've had more problems with Windows programs missing DLL files after an install than I ever have with an apt-get installed program. Then again, that's just personal preference. I mainly want to inform, not evangalize.

The permissions problem is not "weird" at all. It's a system that's actually quite simple and is, I'm pretty sure, also used in OS X. The system in the NT-based Windows OSes is very similar if not identical. The difference is that it's hidden from the user. Some Linux distributions do this also.

I can't think of why e-mailing from a Linux system could possibly slow things down unless you were running your own mail server, in which case it's probably misconfigured. Otherwise the problem would almost have to be due to either network troubles or a problem with either your mail server (e.g., the hotmail or yahoo mail computer that stores your inbox and processes your sent-mail), or the receiving mail server (the computer that processes whatever mail you just sent).

There's also no reason Linux would be the problem with connecting to FTP servers. Actually pretty much any networking and/or client-server type tasks are what Linux excels at. Chances are most of the FTP and web servers you connect to are running Linux.

The 'looks better' and 'is organized better' arguments are very subjective. There are a number of geeky people who like the way Linux is organized. Although personally I'll agree with you on both counts normally (I disagree with the looks better once you start getting into Linux desktop themes, but I agree if we're speaking defaults).

Keep in mind a great number of Windows people would be quick to use all the same arguments you just gave why Windows is better than Mac. Especially compatibility issues. 90% of all software runs on Windows and Windows alone. I think I even remember hearing that Microsoft was going to drop Mac versions of Office after this release, which will increase peoples' compatibility complaints a million percent. And if you want an example of Mac's 'quirky' behavior, hit the Enter key.

::snip::

Also..that's another thing, with Mandrake there are no permissions of the sort. Well, it could be that I'm set up as a Workstation Client, and not on the Server side of things....

Lastly.. it's kind of a contradiction?(not sure if that's the right word) to say that Mac OS X is a Robust Unix OS...and not say the same thing about other Linux Distros. They've all been around a long time, they're all damn powerful, and full of features. Granted Mac has been around probably a tad bit longer than most Linux distros.. so it's got a bit more experience.
And their all built on UNIX. Hence the *nix name in all the names. (with the exception of Mac OS X ..it's name wanted to be different, without the *nix.)

I assure you Mandrake does have permissions in the exact same way every other Linux distribution as well as Mac OS X do. Similar to OS X, this is probably being hidden from you as a user to simplify things, although it's still there if you'd like to modify it yourself. Just open up a console window and type

Code: Select all

ls -l

and you'll see the permissions in the leftmost column.

On to some technicalities. Arguably, none of them are built on Unix. Linux definitely isn't--it's been built to be Unix-like, but it is not the same as Unix. OS X runs on a modified a version of BSD-Unix (specifically FreeBSD), which is an actual type of Unix although it's not System V Unix which is what makes something able to be called Unix according to the trademark terms.

Also, while the original Mac came out a few years before Linux did, OS X is a complete rewrite of the Mac system. Before that Mac was entirely different and not based on Unix. I personally don't think Macs before OS X qualified as computers.

Well, you're probably right. But I didn't like the way the file system is organized, and I still contend that the meta-data features of the HFS+ file system are so much superior to UFS and FAT32/NTFS. My biggest problem with Linux is the compatibility issue; it's hard to make it work with a lot of hardware and software, which can be a problem. (Or, at least in America it is; if you go to Germany, for instance, Linux has a much bigger user base.)

File system organization is a personal preference, but that is one of the most common and understandable arguments against Linux today. As far as the file system abilities go, HFS+ is good, but I think you'd be hard-pressed to argue that it's superior to UFS. NTFS I'm not certain about, but I've heard from people I trust that it's crap. FAT32 is beyond crap, and anyone who's used Windows 95/98/Me should know that. Also, just FYI, Linux doesn't run on UFS. The BSD-Unices and some commercial Unix systems (Solaris) do. Linux can have different file systems, but the common ones are ext2, ext3, and reiserfs, with ext2 being by far the most common.

Software compatibility I've covered. As far as hardware compatibility, you're insane. Linux supports a vast amount more hardware than OS X does. The hardware for OS X is proprietary, and thus you only get what Apple is willing to make for you. As far as peripherals, I think about as many that support Apple support Linux. And really these days Red Hat and Mandrake support around 90% of the hardware Windows supports, which is impressive considering they usually don't get the de-facto standard treatment Windows does.

Sorry this was excessively long, but I had a lot to say.

[Michael]

I think I even remember hearing that Microsoft was going to drop Mac versions of Office after this release, which will increase peoples' compatibility complaints a million percent.

MS is abandoning IE, not Office. You have apparently been misinformed.

I personally don't think Macs before OS X qualified as computers.

Uh...why? That's the most ludicrous think I have ever heard in my life.

The hardware for OS X is proprietary, and thus you only get what Apple is willing to make for you. As far as peripherals, I think about as many that support Apple support Linux.

And again, you are misinformed. Apple makes very little hardware aside from its computers, and you can use more than just Apple hardware on Macs. I use Lacie drives that are compatible with Windows and Mac, for instance. It's unfortunate there are people like you who think you know everything, but really you know relatively little, and just end up spreading misinformation about Macintoshes. Macs use very little proprietary hardware. That statement you made is flat-out wrong.

[jester22c]

... ouch

[Anthony]

I think I even remember hearing that Microsoft was going to drop Mac versions of Office after this release, which will increase peoples' compatibility complaints a million percent.

MS is abandoning IE, not Office. You have apparently been misinformed.

Not only will they no longer make IE for the Mac... They have said they will stop work on IE for all platforms.

[insomica]

Stevec what is your background? Where did you come from?

[Robpol86]

macs r computers, so is anything that computes...

but macs (@least the ones before osx) were completely diff from pcs. I personally dont like macs for reasons i already stated, but this is my opinions. even though i hate them, they DO have their positives. they have strong positives because of the power they have for video editin, snd editin, and other stuff i dont remember. the only thing that there not good at is gaming (even though theres more games being made that support macs).

thats my .02

[stevec]

MS is abandoning IE, not Office. You have apparently been misinformed.

I wasn't talking about the decision to drop IE. Not that Macs need it--Safari, Mozilla Firebird, and Opera are all superior browsers that run on OS X.

I thought I'd read some news article (Slashdot, maybe) a few weeks ago that said Microsoft was discontinuing Office for Macs after this release. Some searching and I can't find it, so maybe I dreamed it. Most likely I misremembered an article talking about how Microsoft has the option as of this summer to discontinue the Mac Office line. My mistake.

Uh...why? That's the most ludicrous think I have ever heard in my life.

Firstly, if you re-read the sentence, that was my opinion. I hope that having an opinion is acceptable, considering half your argument against Linux was opinion-based. Although I don't think very highly of pre-OS X Macs, I was intentionally overstating for dramatic effect. I apologize if I've offended you--I've got some Mac friends and I know that Mac people get very defensive of their OS in a cult-like sense.

Why do I think that? Because Mac OS 9.x and below is garbage. I've used them enough to know that Windows was more stable by Win98, which is pretty sad. Actually, I think the cooperative multitasking they use is more akin to Windows 3.11 than the 9x kernel. There's little if any sense of system maintenance. Eventually the whole OS becomes so bogged down with extensions and control panels (which also adversely affect stability) that you either have to delete them from the System Folder manually, reinstall the system, or learn to love holding the shift key down every time you boot. Although I may be wrong about this, I'm not aware of any included or free disk defragmenter, even though (as I mentioned in my last post) HFS and HFS+ are both prone to fragmentation.

Skipping all that, there's the stupid idea of using the content creator to open a file, because obviously if I'm opening an image I want to wait for Photoshop to load. Then again I guess you really can't blame Apple there, since being superior for Photoshop was the main reason anyone owned a Mac. Not that you could blame them, since it takes Macs five times longer to do anything than Windows on older hardware. Sorry, that was also an overstatement for dramatic effect. It doesn't *really* take five times longer. Just longer.

And then there's the fact that the behavior of the Enter key is very counterintuitive. I could go on, but I'm trying to make this shorter than my last post.

And again, you are misinformed. Apple makes very little hardware aside from its computers ::snip::

So aside from the computer, they don't make much computer hardware? How silly of me not to realize that.

Hmm. Aside from the computer would probably mostly mean peripherals, which would be exactly what I said was supported equally well or better in Linux.

It's unfortunate there are people like you who think you know everything, but really you know relatively little, and just end up spreading misinformation about Macintoshes.

At no point did I claim to know everything, or even a lot. I just tried to share what I do know. So do me a favor and drop the lame fan-boy insults, because the last thing I feel like doing is turning this into a flame war on a message board I just started on and wasting the time and bandwidth of the people who have better things to do than listen to your religious defense.

Macs use very little proprietary hardware. That statement you made is flat-out wrong.

Yeah. Very little aside from the computer. We covered that.
The motherboard, chipset, and processor are proprietary, and seeing as those are the important parts that everything else is dependent on, I'd say it's a pretty significant amount of hardware. If you think I'm wrong about that, tell me how I can run OS X without getting an Apple-brand motherboard.

My only point was that your assertion about hardware support for Linux being deficient seemed somewhat misguided, especially considering your interest in Macs. Was there really a need to drag that out into a tangential argument?

[fuuucckkers]

Now now children... settle down.
Enough with the Mac / Linux Flame War..

Keep it a happy forum!

oh... and Steve.. watch the language.. TV-14 please
And welcome to the boards.

[Robpol86]

we sould make a "Flaming" section in the forums, o wait, nm...

[stevec]

Stevec what is your background? Where did you come from?

The first one's a pretty broad question. I'll do them in reverse order, if that's alright.

I pretty much wandered in off the street. I have a friend who used AIM+ and I got kinda curious about it. I figured I'd come see if it had a Linux port or any features that would be worth trying to code a Gaim plugin to copy. I also got curious about what tools the developers used to write their software (language, mostly--trying to figure out how much of a pain it would be to port to other OSes).

That led me to the forums where I searched for Linux and found several threads, including this one, and one thread about AIM+ not being developed anymore. I got sick of reading it after going through about 20 pages of comments (either my connection was slow at the time or this server really lags), but I'm still kinda curious what specifically happened, because it seems like a good thing to know if I'm planning on doing any freeware/open source development myself.

My background. I apologize cause this is going to be really long, but I'm hoping to answer any specifics you were wanting about my background.

I'm currently a senior majoring in psychology, cognitive science, and computer science at Indiana University. I started programming in BASIC on a Commadore 64 (and Apple IIe) when I was like, 8, but didn't really stick with it too much. When my parents upgraded to a Dell 486SX I had lots of fun mastering DOS 5.0 and up. Having AOL as my ISP I think kinda prevented me from learning much more beyond my system, and that didn't get upgraded till I got a Windows 98 box as a graduation present and then came to college.

My real passion for computers has only come about since then. IU's massive bandwidth and being the most wired campus in the nation probably helped, since I got to discover the joys of the internet and networking. Since then I've been making up for time lost on AOL in curiosity, interest, and tons of time and reading (except for the last six months or so, due to a time-intensive girlfriend). I've worked a network/pc consulting job for the University for the last three years. I'm planning on going to grad school for computer security, which is the biggest of my interests in all things computer.

I'm an average programmer (I'd like to think above average, but I've got no facts to back that up yet), although still very inexperienced. I know enough about web design to be competent. I'm pretty good with networking. I'm excellent at hardware, operating systems, and security.

Since I'm currently living in a place that I'm just subletting for the summer, I only brought one of my computers with me. The hard drive on that died, so I got another computer out of storage and decided to go straight GNU/Linux (Debian). I've ran linux before but this is the first time I've run it without also having Windows on either another partition or computer. Really, it's been such a good experience this time that I don't think I'll ever use Windows except for porting and beta testing apps.

And a little confession: I only posted initially because I was procrastinating from something and I really, really enjoy talking about/explaining various computer things. I probably wouldn't have said anything more if Michael hadn't tried to imply I didn't know what I was talking about.

Someone mentioned in another thread I read something about a tech forum that was way over their head. I think ideally I'd like to find something like that that's about all facets of computers. I want to be able to explain things about computers people don't know about to them, talk with people who know what I know, and be able to ask questions and learn things from other people all in the same place. It'd make my life a lot easier than the 20+ newsgroups I try to keep tabs on now. If anyone has any suggestions on such a place I would be eternally grateful.

[stevec]

oh... and Steve.. watch the language.. TV-14 please
And welcome to the boards.

Thanks. Sorry about that. I looked through the FAQ to see if there was a language policy before I posted, but I didn't see anything. If you can/want to edit it please do so.

[Matt]

I'm currently a senior majoring in psychology, cognitive science, and computer science at Indiana University.

I am working with a professor that got his MS and PhD from Indiana University down here at FSU. From what he said, its a really good school.

And welcome to the boards.

[fuuucckkers]

Someone mentioned in another thread I read something about a tech forum that was way over their head. I think ideally I'd like to find something like that that's about all facets of computers. I want to be able to explain things about computers people don't know about to them, talk with people who know what I know, and be able to ask questions and learn things from other people all in the same place. It'd make my life a lot easier than the 20+ newsgroups I try to keep tabs on now. If anyone has any suggestions on such a place I would be eternally grateful.

http://tek-tips.com -- Everything Computer Related is there. Programming, Hardware, Software, Graphics, Web Design.. EVERYTHING.

It's run mostly by computer professionals as a place to go get help if you need it. I've went there plenty of times asking stupid little questions, and gotten ALOT of help from numerous people.

If you're looking for a Forum to expand your horizons, that's the place.

[Michael]

Although I may be wrong about this, I'm not aware of any included or free disk defragmenter, even though (as I mentioned in my last post) HFS and HFS+ are both prone to fragmentation.

File fragmentation is rarely as big a deal as people make it out to be, but that's my $0.02 from my own experience.

It doesn't *really* take five times longer. Just longer.

Point noted, but I doubt you've had the fortune of using some newer Macs which are way faster -- especially the new G5's.

And then there's the fact that the behavior of the Enter key is very counterintuitive. I could go on, but I'm trying to make this shorter than my last post.

Not sure what you mean by this... But really, the Enter key isn't even used much at all on a Mac.

So aside from the computer, they don't make much computer hardware? How silly of me not to realize that.

Actually, they don't. They sell CD-R/DVD-ROM drives, and CDRW/DVD-RW drives, and a RAID array, but other than that, not much hardware per se.

Hmm. Aside from the computer would probably mostly mean peripherals, which would be exactly what I said was supported equally well or better in Linux.

Most Windows-compatible hardware is also Mac-compatible. I have a Linux workstation, and believe me, some of the hardware is not as fluid as with Windows or Macintosh.

Yeah. Very little aside from the computer. We covered that. The motherboard, chipset, and processor are proprietary, and seeing as those are the important parts that everything else is dependent on, I'd say it's a pretty significant amount of hardware. If you think I'm wrong about that, tell me how I can run OS X without getting an Apple-brand motherboard.

I don't see why everyone looks down on Apple for making both the computers and the OS. Computers made that way function better. Look at SGI workstations and Sun SPARCstations. They're some of the best computers in the world, and they are semi-proprietary. (The same company develops the OS and the computers.)

My only point was that your assertion about hardware support for Linux being deficient seemed somewhat misguided, especially considering your interest in Macs. Was there really a need to drag that out into a tangential argument?

Oh, I get it. I'm a Mac user, so that means I know nothing about computers. Ignore the fact that I have a Linux workstation, and a Windows desktop as well, and I work with Sun workstations at work, as well as a few terminals on a System V network. I use a Mac so I know nothing.

Look, I didn't mean to sound brash, but really, I'm tired of people coming around and knocking Macs, and saying how Linux is so much better. Linux is not fun to use, in my opinion. Linux, overall, is very counter-intuitive. It's great for server applications, but as a desktop computer, I personally prefer something that's a little more convenient. That's why I like neither Windows nor Linux -- I find I spend more time trying to figure out how to do something, rather than actually being productive.

Maybe it's not "cool" to use a Mac these days, but I think that a lot of people claim to like Linux just because it's so in vogue to say you're a Linux user.

Again, just my $0.02. Linux is pretty cool for a lot of things -- I especially like its server applications -- and I'd rather use Linux than Windows any day. But in my experience, it's been more problematic than it's worth, and I just think a lot of people -- maybe not you, but a lot of other people -- say Linux rocks just so people think they are really cool.

Maybe it comes more from my background. I've used command-line System V and BSD way more than I've used Linux. I think Linux has the potential to be a damn good OS, and I hope to keep seeing it grow, but really, I think it needs to be a lot more user-friendly before it can make great inroads into the desktop market. I think it would be great if someone could make Linux as simple and friendly as Apple made BSD. I used various Unixes before, but I really like OS X because I have a user-friendly interface, combined with the power of Unix. Someone can make Linux just as much fun to use and believe me, I'm sold.