Re: [announcement] SYSAPI and SYSSVC for Windows

["Ekkehard Morgenstern" <ekkehard.morgenstern@onlinehome.de>]

"Ludovic Brenta" <ludovic.brenta@insalien.org> wrote:
> As I said: your investment in Windows-specific programs made you
> Captive.  You are not alone in this situation.

Yes, and it continues. People are forced to use Windows for some
reason or other, and that limits their OS choices.

I used to have a GNU/Linux-only system in 1996, but there were bugs
in some IPC code, and I couldn't use it and returned to Windows.

As a programmer, I don't really care on what platform I develop on,
as long as it works.

As a user, I'm forced to use Windows, because many drivers are only
available on Windows. For example, there are ISDN and DSL drivers for
GNU/Linux, but the setup might be complicated, and it might take days
or weeks to get them to work. USB drivers might also be a problem,
and I have plenty of USB devices. Also, my 3D graphics card might not
be supported, or my TV card, and so on.

I know there's plenty of good programs in the GNU/Linux, *BSD etc.
program libraries. But I would have either to get my machine to run
any of the free OSes properly, or to install it on a seperate machine
with a less complicated set-up and use the Windows box as a server.

As for hardware drivers, Windows drivers are often (esp. if certified
by Microsoft) more fault-tolerant and reliable.

However, the driver model is one of Windows' weak points, since it's
not upward compatible enough (also applies to the APIs). Hence, many
companies deliver uncertified drivers with lots of bugs, often more
of them than corresponding GNU/Linux drivers.

BTW, my SYSAPI / SYSSVC library is fully open-source! I yet need to add
a GPL license, however. The source is included in the archive as I stated.

I have plans for a new kind of open-source operating system, and it might
support running GNU/Linux, *BSD, and Windows apps. For example, I might
provide an interface to load GNU/Linux drivers. I will use Ada as an
implementation language. For now, it will run on top of some host OS,
currently Windows, and GNU/Linux and/or FreeBSD in the future.

> It does permit running some of the Windows apps on GNU/Linux.  Wine
> has been production-worthy for a couple of years now.

*cough* I've read (and seen) other things! ;)

Luckily, there's a list of programs that are known to run.

> Now, the poor quality of Microsoft applications (especially WRT
> security and viruses) makes it, ah, difficult to choose them when
> you've got free alternatives.  Hence the lack of interest in running
> Microsoft apps on GNU/Linux.

I have no security or virus problems. I've been using Windows Update
once a week to install the latest patches, and recently I've also
installed a virus scanner that found no viruses so far.

Windows XP has a built-in firewall that is good enough for daily use
(if it's switched on, that is! ;) ).

But yeah, price is an issue. Free OSes like GNU/Linux often come
in distributions with plenty of packages, and if you download them
yourself, you don't even need to pay for that.

However, some of the better drivers for GNU/Linux don't come for free,
and then the advantage of it can dwindle. Like, a good sound card driver,
or a good NTFS driver cost quite some buck.

In a sense, it's also a money machinery, whether or not desired so by
its authors.

So it's difficult to decide, especially on some desktop workstation,
which OS to choose from.

A server with memory, processor(s), disk and ethernet is a different
kind of beast than a multimedia desktop for watching TV, playing
movies and DVDs, creating and listening to music, or playing or
authoring 3D games, plus plenty of add-on hardware for PCI, AGP or
USB buses. That's why it might be a problem for some people to decide
for one of the free OSes if there's no clarity about whether the
hardware is supported.

It happened once, at my former employer, when I installed a server
with some GNU/Linux and the machine hung every now and then. If you
don't have time to fix the problem, you wipe GNU/Linux off your
harddisk and install Windows 2000 or something, which works right
out of the box, and even better after an update.

There should be something like a GNU/Linux software quality
assurance group that makes sure that all available packages do indeed
work.

I knew the GNU project even before the Linux kernel was developed,
and I had GNU ports for AmigaOS. And I still remember that GCC didn't
work, because it was compiled with itself and every GNU tool suffered
the same problems. And the only comment from the distributor in the
"ReadMe" file was "here's the latest version, I didn't get around to
test it". ;) -- of course, later on, there were some good GNU ports
for AmigaOS, also before GNU/Linux was a topic.

> Most GNU/Linux or {Free,Net,Open}BSD distributions come with much,
> much more than 1.5 Gb of libraries, and it increases by the day.  Not
> only are the libraries there, you can also inspect their source code
> and get in touch with their developers.  You can extend them to suit
> your needs, and have your changes merged into the main line of
> development.  Try that with components supplied by Microsoft.

That's true of course, but you're talking about program packages,
not components. Unfortunately, there's no documentation for all the
OLE components provided in Windows. :(

You have to use an OLE browser and figure the details out yourself.

> But for people who just cannot think outside the wonderful world of
> Microsoft, there is a project called Mono[1] to provide a
> .NET-compliant platform on GNU/Linux.  Complete with the freedom to
> modify it, of course.
>
> [1] http://www.go-mono.com

Thanks for the link! :)

> They are here: http://www.gnome.org, http://www.kde.org, and included
> in all major distributions.  BTW, both include a component framework �
> la Microsoft DCOM.

Now, which one to choose? GNOME or KDE? And which apps run where?

I'm surprised you think that they're easy to use. Perhaps some things
changed. I haven't used GNOME yet, and the latest KDE I've seen was 2.0.

> Besides, I do not want an easy-to-use system.  I want a powerful
> system which I can control and modify to suit my needs.  This is
> particularly important, IMHO, when developing software that depends on
> gigabytes of other software.

Yeah, but how often do you actually modify it?

I certainly don't have enough time to write my own sound card driver
for GNU/Linux or a better kernel that works properly (I haven't seen
the new 2.6 yet, but the versions of the 2.4 that I've seen and/or
their drivers weren't reliable).

I want to write application software and development tools foremost,
and then I have to rely on the underlying system.

> But the GNU/Linux community does exploit the situation properly.  So
> do the *BSD communities.
>
> For technically savvy users, Debian, Gentoo or the *BSD's are the
> ultimate distributions where updates are made available every day.

Yes, I once bought a Debian distrib, and the installer wasn't working.
This gives you the tech Debian feel that makes you wish for a hammer.

Not that I'm impatient or anything, but after a couple of days of
messing with it I returned to good old Windoze. ;)

Untested distributions, mmmm! ;)

Perhaps next time I will download and compose my own distribution to
avoid such problems.

> For newbies, Mandrake, SuSE, Knoppix or LindowsOS provide the ultimate
> in ease of installation.  Just take your pick: you are Free.  For more
> information, you should pay a visit to http://www.distrowatch.com.

These distributions can become more expensive than Windows when you
update them regularly.

On the other hand, if they do indeed work, you can live with them
for years without or with selective updating, as you said below.

> And most of the distros have package management systems (apt or RPM)
> that put Microsoft to shame.

Don't forget that Windows has a simpler organization and nowadays,
Setup programs like InstallShield do all the installing jobs for the user.

The cross-depency stuff in the RPM's works only if it's configured
and tested properly. I often had it that an RPM installation broke
more than it added to the system. Perhaps it's a bad idea to rely
on scripts for installing.

But on Windows, there are also bad installers, even with InstallShield. ;)

> And yes, they do run properly whether or
> not you update them, because they are much less vulnerable to viruses
> than Windows.

That's true for most parts, but things like sendmail or the network
configuration can provide security risks too. Or bad access rights.

Especially Windows XP is quite safe when patched up properly.

(there's sendmail, httpd and inetd patches now for GNU/Linux etc. too,
things do evolve indeed)