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Microsoft Challenges Linux's Legacy Claims | |
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| Time: 10:40 EST/15:40 GMT | News Source: eWeek | Posted By: John Quigley | ||
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Microsoft Corp.'s Linux and open-source lab on the Redmond campus has been running some interesting tests of late, one of which was looking at how well the latest Windows client software runs on legacy hardware in comparison to its Linux competitors. While this may seem strange, given Microsoft's desire to upgrade every possible customer to the latest version of Windows, often resulting in a forced hardware upgrade as well, that strategy is far more effective in the developed world than among developing nations, Bill Hilf, who is director of Platform Technology Strategy at Microsoft and runs the lab, told eWEEK in a recent interview. | ||
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| #1 By 39852 (207.164.28.13) at 1/8/2006 11:08:49 AM |
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Even if you can install Windows 98 on a 486SX, it doesn't mean you can run the latest software. Also, add an antivirus, antispyware, and firewall, and the system becomes even more unusable. Add in the fact that MS won't patch Windows 98 for the WMF problem (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060105-5914.html - last three paragraphs, and others in the future) and you don't have a usable system.
If you're using the PC offline, you're going to need the latest applications to stay compatible (Office 12, etc) which won't run on it since it won't install on that system (doesn't meet minimum requirements) or it can be forced but will just be too slow. In this case you're better off with Linux because you'll be able to use recent applications. They will install and be relatively fast compared to the Windows alternatives. OSS applications such as AbiWord etc may still run on earlier versions of Windows, but if all you're going to be using is OSS, then you might as well use Linux and get a more stable and faster system than you would with Windows 98 etc. Rather than hacking 98 up with 98Lite and installing a custom shell such as GeoShell or something, you can get a more stable and faster system with Linux... try www.damnsmalllinux.org for example. I ran that on a Pentium 166MHz with 64MB RAM and got good performance -- when I was running off the LiveCD! Installed to the hard disk it would be even faster and would work great on a 486 compared to Windows. A 486 running Windows has trouble playing MP3s in WinAMP without stuttering and has trouble catching up with video on my PCI ATI All-In-Wonder (My 486 motherboard supports PCI but more often than not they don't, I've got a few of each type). DMA is enabled on all storage devices. However when running Linux, these problems don't exist and I can even record video with my TV tuner! Software that runs on Windows 98 also runs fine in WINE, so you'd be able to use any Windows-only software on that 486 in Linux and make it run faster than in Windows! But Desktops aren't the only use for older hardware, and a 486 could easily be converted into a file/media server, print server, web server, firewall/wireless/router box, or home stereo and many other functions with Linux-based software. 486s could easily be turned into thin clients as well. Also, for additional information on how DamnSmallLinux performs on a 486 w/16MB RAM: http://damnsmalllinux.org/486.html This post was edited by Mister on Sunday, January 08, 2006 at 13:28. |
| #2 By 32132 (142.32.208.231) at 1/8/2006 3:31:26 PM |
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I always encourage people who insist on clinging to their 486's to run Linux. Let them bad mouth Linux instead of Windows when the machine craps out because of ancient hardware.
If they do want some advice about old machines I always say, buy a Dell for a couple of hundred dollars. They usually throw in a copy of Windows XP for a trivial price, and a CD Burner , and a new harddrive instead of one that is 7 or 8 years old (and 80GB is better than 1.2GB). |
| #3 By 8556 (12.207.222.149) at 1/8/2006 4:16:20 PM |
| There is a lot of subjetive commentary and anecdotal verbage in the artical and in Misters comment. Where are the measurements to back up the comments? In any case with many small business's in love with proprietary software like Quick Books and Peachtree it is impossible to sell Linux boxes to them as they cannot just run the same programs and do not have the time or are not willing to reload all their financial data and relearn new programs in an age of lean business where there is no spare time. If they did change their accounting firms would need to redo their systems as well. Linux seems mired in niche areas along with experimenters only because Windows was firmly entrenched when it arrived. This situation is not about to change. |
| #4 By 8273 (24.22.214.140) at 1/8/2006 6:37:34 PM |
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#1 You are talking about how Win 98 is vulnerable to the WMF problem, and advocate Wine. According to slashdot, Wine is vulnerable to the same problem, and it still has not been fixed: http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/06/2043203&tid=172&tid=125&tid=106
So where is your criticism of WINE? In fact, you are leading people to think that they are more secure by using WINE, when in fact, they are not. |
| #5 By 12071 (203.206.243.239) at 1/8/2006 7:14:42 PM |
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1) Regardless of what OS you choose to run, try and get a better PC if you can! I remember installing Windows 95 on my friends 486 in July of 95 (I only had a 386DX at the time - waiting to upgrade to that Pentium 100). Needless to say, you could literally start the pc, go have lunch and come back before it would finish booting! The speed of it at that stage was slightly better but nothing even remotely close to useable! Linux running on that box, I would say, would have the same issues trying to run the latest KDE/Gnome for similar reasons.
#4 You know, if you're going to read Slashdot, you should read more than the headline - you might learn something! The WINE fix was fixed the very same day: Revision 1.12 / (download) - [select for diffs], Fri Jan 6 20:52:46 2006 UTC (111 minutes, 55 seconds ago) by julliard Branch: MAIN CVS Tags: HEAD Changes since 1.11: +7 -0 lines Diff to previous 1.11 (colored) Marcus Meissner gdi: Filter GETSCALINGFACTOR and SETABORTDOC proc in metafile Escapes. As a result those people that were running WINE were in fact safer than you as they had the patch available to be used the very same day! |
| #6 By 8273 (24.22.214.140) at 1/8/2006 10:58:08 PM |
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#5, in fact, I did read the article. I read the article when it was still the first news item on /. web page. The only indication of a fix from WINE is in this line from the zdnet link:
Marcus Meissner (meissner@suse.de) contacted the Wine development team and sent them a patch to fix this flaw. But that does not mean that the fix was tested and released to the public. And the winehq.com website is no help either. Looking over their page, they talk about some fixes for MSI and IDL compiler, but nothing about the WMF fix. MS has a link right on their start page. But isn't this showing a bit more hiprocracy from the OSS group? They claim that milions of eyes help find bugs. Those eyes did not find this one. The OSS community claims that MS puts functionality above security. Isn't that what the WINE developers did here - implement functionality to maintain compatibility with Windows at the cost of functionality? Yes, MS screwed up here, they implemented code that was bad. But in advocating WINE as #1 did, a program that is intentionally implementing security bugs (really there is no indication that they knew, but I thought the OSS community was security minded and did not write code that could be used to do harm), isn't that causing more harm than good? |
| #7 By 12071 (203.206.243.239) at 1/9/2006 4:16:55 AM |
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#6 Would you like me to provide you with a link directly to the comment in that Slashdot story which I copied and pasted in #5? I'll be more than glad to.
"MS has a link right on their start page." After the sheer amount of press that the WMF bug received, I think we would all be shocked if the MS PR machine didn't put the link to such a high profile patch that everyone has been waiting for several weeks. "But isn't this showing a bit more hiprocracy from the OSS group?" I don't think so, please explain. "They claim that milions of eyes help find bugs." They do - that's not to say that they will find every single bug out there but if you look through bugtraq, securityfocus and places like that you'll see that many if not most bugs for OSS are found by those millions of eyes that you speak of. "Those eyes did not find this one." No, and they've missed many others too. They're only human and hence won't find every single bug possible - but given the number of people looking they will find a lot more then they could otherwise if they didn't have the source code available to them. If you're looking for perfection you'll need to look elsewhere. "Isn't that what the WINE developers did here - implement functionality to maintain compatibility with Windows at the cost of [security]?" You'll need to speak to the WINE developers in this case. As far as I can see: a) the WINE developers are creating a product to implement the core Win32 API with identical functionality. b) as shown in this case, the WINE developers re-created the identical functionality! Should they have fixed this bug whilst re-creating the functionality - possibly, as I said you'll need to speak to the WINE developers for a more incise answer but as I see it they left it as it was incase that functionality was required for some other reason. For examples of this take a look at their source code of other API functions where there are comments around dodgy code due to trying to maintain compatibility with Microsoft's versions. "Yes, MS screwed up here, they implemented code that was bad. " That's not why they screwed up... everyone is going to make coding errors, you can't change that. They screwed up with their handling of this vulnerability and in their handling of fairly much ALL their vulnerabilities! The fact is that Microsoft will sit on a bug unless it hits their bottom line or causes them bad PR which will eventually lead to hitting their bottom line! That's the only reason we saw this patch this early. Don't believe me? Take a look at eeye (http://www.eeye.com/html/research/upcoming/index.html) for instance where there are upcoming bugs that have been without a patch for 249, 196, 161, 90 etc days. That's why they screwed up! We even saw an unofficial patch released by a 3rd party before Microsoft made anything whatsoever available to users whilst there were over 50 verified exploits being used! That patch shows that if the source code is available to all then we can have patches out in a quicker time! Look at the WINE patch - created the same day the bug was verified against it! Are both patches released perfect? - no, the Windows one has been shown to break some functionality although I haven't heard about any issues with the WINE one. But at least they were available for you to use if you so wished rather than waiting for the almighty to give you the official patch. That is why Microsoft screwed up! "But in advocating WINE as #1 did" I'm not here to defend Mister but let's look at the facts for a minute. If you are currently running Windows 98 - you are vulnerable with no offical patch to help you out. If on the other hand you are running WINE, there is a patch available for you. In that particular case, I'd advocate WINE too. |
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