Service Pack 2 sheds light on Longhorn
With the release of Microsoft’s Service Pack 2 for Windows XP later this month, users will be re-evaluating their upgrade plans.
Existing Windows XP desktops are likely to receive the SP2 update, while Windows 2000 users have the choice of moving directly to XP SP2 or waiting until Longhorn, the next major Windows release arrives.
Service Pack 2 is widely viewed as a significant update, offering greater security and bundling more functions into the operating system. More importantly, it will offer a taste of things to come from Microsoft: the eagerly-awaited operating system codenamed Longhorn.
This, the next version of Windows, has been described by Microsoft chairman and chief software architect Bill Gates as the biggest product release for Microsoft since Windows 95.
"[Longhorn] is going to be a very big release: the biggest release of this decade," he told a developers conference in October 2003. "We are tackling three different areas: the fundamentals - that means the security - the auto-installation and applications not interfering with each other."
Currently scheduled to be released in 2007, Longhorn will alter the way the operating system functions and integrates with other applications.
Neil Macehiter, research director at analyst firm Ovum, said, "Longhorn is a very significant release for Microsoft and it does change some of the rules of what an operating system does. Microsoft is fundamentally re-architecting the operating system so it can deliver more sophisticated capability than before."
Planned new features include a new mechanism for storing files, technology to help different applications to talk to each other, probably using web services technology and speech recognition.
Meanwhile, Longhorn development rumbles on. In June, Microsoft released an early version of the operating system to subscribers to its developers network and to WinHEC 2004 conference delegates.
"The WinHEC build represents the next milestone of Longhorn on the way to the final release," said Chris Sells, content strategist for the MSDN Longhorn Developer Centre.
He said Microsoft plans to provide regular updates of Longhorn code to the developer community to obtain their feedback.
Although Longhorn is still three years away, IT directors and their system software developers can begin to review the operating system and plan their IT strategy.
The Longhorn developer community is already producing ideas for new applications and initiatives using the next version of Windows.
Third-party suppliers are working on ways to combine voice, video and data in the next-generation graphical interface, Avalon. They are also developing voice functions for speech-to-text conversion and a new graphic interface called Facetop. This appears to project the end-user’s face over the windows and applications they are working on.
But the changes to the platform may be too ambitious, according to some industry commentators who are sceptical about the potential take-up of Longhorn.
Annette Jump, principal analyst at Gartner, said, "Microsoft is not very good at communicating the roadmap or sticking to it."
Longhorn’s beta and final release dates have slipped already, with final availability being delayed a year to the first half of 2007, she said, adding that most companies will wait a further year before adopting it.
"Microsoft is keeping very quiet about Longhorn. This could present a problem of how to persuade customers to sign up to licences if they don’t know when it is out," said Jump.
Gates has talked about the Longhorn wave: a number of Longhorn products are being released before and after the operating system, although they will be aligned with the core operating system. Products such as Visual Studio 2005 (code-named Whidbey) and SQL Server 2005 (Yukon) will come out before Longhorn, but will contain some of its technology. Next-generation products, such as Visual Studio, code-named Orcas, are expected post-Longhorn.
Microsoft builds three pillars for Longhorn
Pillar one is a common communications framework, called Indigo, which can control the way different applications communicate and share data. Indigo works out how to package information and the best channel on which to send it, whether that is web services through the .net infrastructure, by using peer-to-peer technology or instant messaging.
"All the investment Microsoft is making into web services will appear in Indigo," said Neil Macehiter, research director at Ovum.
Although the changes Microsoft is making will have benefits, he said, they will also affect the fundamental design of other applications. "The implications for Microsoft’s other technologies are very significant: where, for example, does Microsoft Exchange store its information if you change the operating system’s file system?"
Pillar two is a storage mechanism for files in the operating system, which will sit on top of the NT File System. Microsoft is tying certain elements of relational databases and the data exchange standard XML into the data filing system to give users more control over how they store and access their data. It will use a common store for data such as contact information which can be accessed centrally by Outlook and an instant messaging client.
Macehiter said, "WinFS essentially allows users to define more about how they want information to be stored and the relationship between data. You can build up some sophisticated ways to manage your data. Microsoft is exploiting the expertise it has in Sequel Server and relational databases and applying it to the operating system."
The final pillar is a graphical user interface, dubbed Avalon, which has 3D and 2D elements and features such as transparent Windows.
Microsoft has chosen a design-led, rather than a programmer-led approach and will allow the application developer to define what they want to see on the desktop, or how they want an application to look, and the code will match it, said Macehiter.
"Apple and Macromedia have been doing this for a long while and successfully. Microsoft is clearly trying to extend the desktop and reassert the position of the rich client, as opposed to the browser," he said.
The image revamp will also help companies to deal with the vast amounts of data produced by IT systems, Microsoft believes.
Another significant addition to Longhorn is the Dynamic Systems Initiative, which is akin to IBM’s adaptive and autonomic computing aspirations. Microsoft’s initiative can be used in a datacentre to automatically add and take away computing or storage resources as applications require, and manage the infrastructure as a whole.
However, complete resource automation through DSI is six- to eight years away, according to Microsoft.
Is Longhorn worth the wait?
Annette Jump, principal analyst at Gartner, said that for organisations using Windows 2000 rather than Windows XP, Longhorn may be their next standard platform, depending on when it arrives.
The main question users have to ask about Longhorn is whether it will be compatible with previous versions of Microsoft software such as Office, she added. Companies should talk to Microsoft’s software partners to see what they are doing about compatibility, she advised.
Ovum research director, Neil Macehiter, said users need to be clear about whether some of the more eye-catching features in Longhorn will be useful for businesses.
"There needs to be a clear business case for Longhorn. Is a 3D desktop useful for a call centre? Probably not. There are compelling capabilities, such as [messaging framework] Indigo, especially for companies that do a lot of application development. And I understand there will be a version available that runs on Windows Server 2003."
sobota, sierpnia 14, 2004
vnunet.com - Gartner questions Munich Linux migration delay
vnunet.com - Gartner questions Munich Linux migration delay: "Gartner questions Munich Linux migration delay
TCO issues may have hit project, suggests analyst
Robert Jaques and Manfred Kohlen in Munich, vnunet.com 12 Aug 2004"
Worries over total cost of ownership rather than growing uncertainty over patent disputes may have formed the main reasons for the city of Munich's decision to defer its high-profile migration to Linux on the desktop, industry experts have speculated.
Concern over EU patents directives was not Munich's primary motivation in freezing its migration of 14,000 desktops from the Windows operating system to an open source offering based on Linux, believes Gartner vice president Andrea Di Maio.
"Legal risks mostly come from US patents, and no vendor with relevant patents seems to have shown any interest in threatening or initiating a lawsuit," said Di Maio in a statement.
"Instead, the patenting issue may have suggested to Munich that it underestimated costs and risks when calculating the total cost of ownership for LiMux."
Gartner added that a recent study by the city of Vienna had been less favourable to migration.
"Both these factors more likely influenced Munich's decision. The EU directive will have no short-term impact on Munich's implementation of LiMux, because it will not go into effect retroactively," said Di Maio.
Munich's mayor has insisted that the project will continue. And while members of the opposition CSU party have questioned whether Linux would really be cheaper than Microsoft, their doubts have been dismissed by insiders.
In the EU, software patents are not currently allowed, but the Patent Law: Patentability Of Computer-Implemented Inventions Directive may introduce them.
The directive, not yet in final form, is receiving its second reading by the European Parliament. Munich has called for concerted opposition to the proposed directive by interested municipalities and enterprises.
TCO issues may have hit project, suggests analyst
Robert Jaques and Manfred Kohlen in Munich, vnunet.com 12 Aug 2004"
Worries over total cost of ownership rather than growing uncertainty over patent disputes may have formed the main reasons for the city of Munich's decision to defer its high-profile migration to Linux on the desktop, industry experts have speculated.
Concern over EU patents directives was not Munich's primary motivation in freezing its migration of 14,000 desktops from the Windows operating system to an open source offering based on Linux, believes Gartner vice president Andrea Di Maio.
"Legal risks mostly come from US patents, and no vendor with relevant patents seems to have shown any interest in threatening or initiating a lawsuit," said Di Maio in a statement.
"Instead, the patenting issue may have suggested to Munich that it underestimated costs and risks when calculating the total cost of ownership for LiMux."
Gartner added that a recent study by the city of Vienna had been less favourable to migration.
"Both these factors more likely influenced Munich's decision. The EU directive will have no short-term impact on Munich's implementation of LiMux, because it will not go into effect retroactively," said Di Maio.
Munich's mayor has insisted that the project will continue. And while members of the opposition CSU party have questioned whether Linux would really be cheaper than Microsoft, their doubts have been dismissed by insiders.
In the EU, software patents are not currently allowed, but the Patent Law: Patentability Of Computer-Implemented Inventions Directive may introduce them.
The directive, not yet in final form, is receiving its second reading by the European Parliament. Munich has called for concerted opposition to the proposed directive by interested municipalities and enterprises.
Thought for the day
Tin men eat their words
Thought for the day
Tin men eat their words
They swore they would never make Linux servers, but the tin makers are changing their tune now that the open-source OS is taking over the top end of the market, says Simon Moores.
Once upon a time I interviewed the managing director of Unisys, Brian Hadfield, and asked him if there might ever come a time when Unisys would consider a Linux alternative to Windows on its flagship ES7000 SMP servers.
His reply still reminds me of Jack Nicholson's snarling put-down, “I’d rather stick needles in my eyes.” I left that meeting with Hadfield realising that Unisys had bet the farm on Windows.
So when I read that Unisys had announced support for Linux, a smile crossed my face. Even three years ago, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and Sun were also dimissing the idea of penguins at the top, but it's now clear that Linux is settling into a comfortable niche at the higher-end of computing.
Sun is rumoured to be on the verge of revealing a Linux port of its Sun Ray Server, and Nasa has announced it will use one of the world’s biggest Linux-based supercomputers, a 1,000Gbyte monster that integrates a score of 512-processor systems, to help revive its shuttle missions after the 2003 Columbia disaster.
Unisys says its decision reflects “customer interest in using the open-source operating system in big datacentres”. The company is working with Linux Novell and Red Hat to put the operating system on its ES7000 platform - often seen as the living, breathing proof that Windows delivers at the top end of the server market.
While Microsoft might not be too pleased at having to share its perfect romance with another partner, Joe McGrath, Unisys president and chief operating officer, says, "Our enterprise customers are demanding industrial-strength Linux solutions and we are responding in a revolutionary way."
I've written a number of ES7000 customer case studies and found that many very large organisations get impressive results from mixing Windows with the Unisys ES7000 but rarely mention cost savings with Linux. The fact that it is the enterprise users of Unisys, rather than IBM, who are apparently demanding Linux solutions, suggests that the evolutionary impact predicted by Linux watchers is finally happening.
Not that a rippling introduction of Linux servers will immediately topple Windows from its position at the top of the ES7000 food-chain. After all, Unisys says Linux's appearance on the Intel-driven ES7000 will compete with proprietary Unix servers. That may come as some comfort to Microsoft, which claims Linux victories come at the expense of other flavours of Unix rather than Windows.
Even so, the writing is clearly on the wall and, thanks to aggressive campaigning by IBM and HP, an increasing number of customers will start making the price/performance comparisons that are pushing Microsoft onto the defensive.
The ES7000 represented the Wintel alliance and its technology at its strongest and purest, but market forces or simple common sense have now gatecrashed the love affair between the companies. While William Shakespeare had nothing to say about Linux or Windows, he did write, “Then must you speak of one who loved not wisely but too well.”
Tin men eat their words
They swore they would never make Linux servers, but the tin makers are changing their tune now that the open-source OS is taking over the top end of the market, says Simon Moores.
Once upon a time I interviewed the managing director of Unisys, Brian Hadfield, and asked him if there might ever come a time when Unisys would consider a Linux alternative to Windows on its flagship ES7000 SMP servers.
His reply still reminds me of Jack Nicholson's snarling put-down, “I’d rather stick needles in my eyes.” I left that meeting with Hadfield realising that Unisys had bet the farm on Windows.
So when I read that Unisys had announced support for Linux, a smile crossed my face. Even three years ago, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and Sun were also dimissing the idea of penguins at the top, but it's now clear that Linux is settling into a comfortable niche at the higher-end of computing.
Sun is rumoured to be on the verge of revealing a Linux port of its Sun Ray Server, and Nasa has announced it will use one of the world’s biggest Linux-based supercomputers, a 1,000Gbyte monster that integrates a score of 512-processor systems, to help revive its shuttle missions after the 2003 Columbia disaster.
Unisys says its decision reflects “customer interest in using the open-source operating system in big datacentres”. The company is working with Linux Novell and Red Hat to put the operating system on its ES7000 platform - often seen as the living, breathing proof that Windows delivers at the top end of the server market.
While Microsoft might not be too pleased at having to share its perfect romance with another partner, Joe McGrath, Unisys president and chief operating officer, says, "Our enterprise customers are demanding industrial-strength Linux solutions and we are responding in a revolutionary way."
I've written a number of ES7000 customer case studies and found that many very large organisations get impressive results from mixing Windows with the Unisys ES7000 but rarely mention cost savings with Linux. The fact that it is the enterprise users of Unisys, rather than IBM, who are apparently demanding Linux solutions, suggests that the evolutionary impact predicted by Linux watchers is finally happening.
Not that a rippling introduction of Linux servers will immediately topple Windows from its position at the top of the ES7000 food-chain. After all, Unisys says Linux's appearance on the Intel-driven ES7000 will compete with proprietary Unix servers. That may come as some comfort to Microsoft, which claims Linux victories come at the expense of other flavours of Unix rather than Windows.
Even so, the writing is clearly on the wall and, thanks to aggressive campaigning by IBM and HP, an increasing number of customers will start making the price/performance comparisons that are pushing Microsoft onto the defensive.
The ES7000 represented the Wintel alliance and its technology at its strongest and purest, but market forces or simple common sense have now gatecrashed the love affair between the companies. While William Shakespeare had nothing to say about Linux or Windows, he did write, “Then must you speak of one who loved not wisely but too well.”
Gartner predicts a virtual revolution
Gartner predicts a virtual revolution: "Gartner predicts a virtual revolution
Virtualisation will become the most disruptive technology to face the PC in a decade, according to research by Gartner.
It reports that PC virtualisation technology will revolutionise the enterprise desktop by decoupling PC hardware and software, allowing multiple operating systems to run simultaneously on a single desktop.
Gartner says virtualisation will enable IS departments to implement more efficient IT support policies, achieve more cost-effective outsourcing contracts for PC support, and drive total cost of ownership savings in PC deployment.
It also says that virtualisation will dramatically redefine the PC industry, removing product differentiation, and forcing suppliers to compete purely on service and price.
Brian Gammage, vice-president at Gartner, said, �PC virtualisation will achieve a broad appeal over the next five years.
'The technology has been used in niche applications for a number of years, but increased industry support from major players, such as Intel and Microsoft, will rapidly move it to the mainstream.
'This will have significant ramifications for the PC hardware, software and wider ICT services industries.�
Gartner sees PC virtualisation as providing a short cut to deployment best practices for users.
Users would be provided with two different environments: one that is unlocked for users to add devices and to install any software they choose, and a fully locked-down, highly managed, and well-understood environment, to which the IS organisation can securely deploy critical business applications.
The IS department would retain full control over network security, while users can install and run new applications that may enhance their effectiveness, without increasing the burden on already beleaguered support staff.
According to Gartner, IS departments which are successful in the deployment of virtualisation technology are also likely to swiftly review both IT services and outsourcing procedures.
PC virtualisation will reportedly assist in drawing clear lines between what is and is not managed by the IS organisation. Gartner says the potentially huge benefits for users will create equally significant implications for the industry.
“Software suppliers will need to become much more flexible in order to compete in this new landscape. Changes in the way software is licensed are inevitable, as PC virtualisation software will challenge current one-licence-per-user ratio.
"In the short term, some will see this as an opportunity to sell more licences: however, this will be harmful in the long run. Few software suppliers have woken up to this deployment scenario, and there is currently little consensus on how they might respond. This is a wake-up call,” says Gammage.
Gartner adds that hardware suppliers and component manufacturers will also be affected, and predicts that the ultimate new standard for client computing will be a virtual platform based on software, not hardware.
Virtualisation will become the most disruptive technology to face the PC in a decade, according to research by Gartner.
It reports that PC virtualisation technology will revolutionise the enterprise desktop by decoupling PC hardware and software, allowing multiple operating systems to run simultaneously on a single desktop.
Gartner says virtualisation will enable IS departments to implement more efficient IT support policies, achieve more cost-effective outsourcing contracts for PC support, and drive total cost of ownership savings in PC deployment.
It also says that virtualisation will dramatically redefine the PC industry, removing product differentiation, and forcing suppliers to compete purely on service and price.
Brian Gammage, vice-president at Gartner, said, �PC virtualisation will achieve a broad appeal over the next five years.
'The technology has been used in niche applications for a number of years, but increased industry support from major players, such as Intel and Microsoft, will rapidly move it to the mainstream.
'This will have significant ramifications for the PC hardware, software and wider ICT services industries.�
Gartner sees PC virtualisation as providing a short cut to deployment best practices for users.
Users would be provided with two different environments: one that is unlocked for users to add devices and to install any software they choose, and a fully locked-down, highly managed, and well-understood environment, to which the IS organisation can securely deploy critical business applications.
The IS department would retain full control over network security, while users can install and run new applications that may enhance their effectiveness, without increasing the burden on already beleaguered support staff.
According to Gartner, IS departments which are successful in the deployment of virtualisation technology are also likely to swiftly review both IT services and outsourcing procedures.
PC virtualisation will reportedly assist in drawing clear lines between what is and is not managed by the IS organisation. Gartner says the potentially huge benefits for users will create equally significant implications for the industry.
“Software suppliers will need to become much more flexible in order to compete in this new landscape. Changes in the way software is licensed are inevitable, as PC virtualisation software will challenge current one-licence-per-user ratio.
"In the short term, some will see this as an opportunity to sell more licences: however, this will be harmful in the long run. Few software suppliers have woken up to this deployment scenario, and there is currently little consensus on how they might respond. This is a wake-up call,” says Gammage.
Gartner adds that hardware suppliers and component manufacturers will also be affected, and predicts that the ultimate new standard for client computing will be a virtual platform based on software, not hardware.
Sleepycat ships Java version of embedded database
Sleepycat ships Java version of embedded database: "Sleepycat ships Java version of embedded database
Sleepycat Software is to ship Berkeley DB Java Edition, a Java version of its embedded database.
Intended for software developers building high-performance applications in which the user does not have to deal with the database, the product is a Java version of the company's C-based Berkeley DB offering.
'Java is more and more important as a big systems language,' said Mike Olson, chief executive officer of Sleepycat. Berkeley
Berkeley DB Java Edition offers Acid (Atomic, Consistent, Isolated, Durable) transactions and recovery for high reliability, record-level locking for high concurrency and schema neutrality for data storage in its native format, according to Sleepycat.
Berkeley DB features the same storage services as the Berkeley DB engine, but was redesigned in Java to take advantage of Java's portability and services such as deeply integrated threading and New IO, the company said."
Sleepycat Software is to ship Berkeley DB Java Edition, a Java version of its embedded database.
Intended for software developers building high-performance applications in which the user does not have to deal with the database, the product is a Java version of the company's C-based Berkeley DB offering.
'Java is more and more important as a big systems language,' said Mike Olson, chief executive officer of Sleepycat. Berkeley
Berkeley DB Java Edition offers Acid (Atomic, Consistent, Isolated, Durable) transactions and recovery for high reliability, record-level locking for high concurrency and schema neutrality for data storage in its native format, according to Sleepycat.
Berkeley DB features the same storage services as the Berkeley DB engine, but was redesigned in Java to take advantage of Java's portability and services such as deeply integrated threading and New IO, the company said."
Thought for the day - Follow that herd!
Thought for the day
Follow that herd!: "Thought for the day
Follow that herd!
You may suspect that the unceasing evolution of the Windows operating system has more to do with Microsoft making sure the bucks don't dry up than with giving users what they want, but it's the only way to get where we really want to be, says Colin Beveridge.
'Longhorn' is an interesting choice of name for Microsoft�s forthcoming �release of the decade� - its new Windows operating system expected in 2007.
For me the word conjures up childhood television memories of cowboys driving teeming herds of cattle over hostile territory towards inevitable slaughter. Week after week in the 1950s and 60s we watched the western heroes deliver their steers safely to their destiny, regardless of the obstacles put in their way by man and nature.
So perhaps the name was simply chosen to reflect the hardiness, resilience and persistence of longhorn cattle - an apposite analogy for a world-class operating system.
This seems quite plausible. After all, what self-respecting company would want to give a flagship development project a lightweight name?
Everybody knows the importance of a project name as an important flag to rally the troops and allies to the cause, and it is difficult to be original, given the burgeoning list of names already used up by an industry obsessed with snappy project titles.
So Longhorn is as good a name as any for Windows 2007, especially as it could end up as Windows 2008, or even 2009 by the time it is finally released.
But some may prefer to believe that the Longhorn label reveals, albeit subliminally, the software giant’s proprietary attitude to herding millions of cowed computer users on a never-ending stampede towards perpetual financial servitude.
That, though, is a short-sighted if widely held view. As an IT director I often hear people who challenge the need for a new desktop operating system. Their concerns generally fall into two broad categories, as follows.
First, why do we need yet another new PC operating system? Why can’t we just call it quits with further development and stick with XP, or whatever flavour of Linux suits our needs now?
Second, why should we let suppliers such as Microsoft drive us ever onwards, beyond our feature comfort zone in many cases? Why do we need a feature-intensive thick-client operating system in the brave new browser-driven world of web services?
My answers to these questions are well-rehearsed but not, I trust, glib.
I am certain we could all exist quite comfortably for many years to come without any further development of the current generation of PC hardware and software. We already have amazing computing power on our desktops and laptops, power undreamed of when the PC revolution began in the 1970s.
But you can be certain that we would not have seen desktop hardware technology advance if we had not been driven by the growing complexity and capability of the operating system. And to be honest, for the last 20 years that has been entirely down to the steady progress of Windows. A bitter pill for some to swallow perhaps, but true even so.
Mankind needs progress and strives for improvement. It's why we're not driving around in cars with stone wheels or in horse-drawn chariots. Technology moves on, relentlessly, until we can't develop it further. So we do need to keep the operating systems moving on if we want to reap the broader benefits of ever faster, increasingly cheaper and pervasive personal technology. If the software stagnates, so will our overall progress.
And until our infrastructure develops even further, we will continue to need feature-intensive, thick-client operating systems for those people who use their computers for all the tasks that are not yet embedded into fully automated business process control systems. We're still a long way from a fully thin-client vision where all our computing is web-served and we must wait and see whether Longhorn complicates or simplifies the move to such a world.
In the meantime, a few mavericks will doubtless attempt to break away from the herd. Good luck to them: genuine competition is healthy. I just hope that Longhorn delivers the promise we need to progress and that the much maligned Office Assistant paperclip is not replaced with a lasso…
Follow that herd!: "Thought for the day
Follow that herd!
You may suspect that the unceasing evolution of the Windows operating system has more to do with Microsoft making sure the bucks don't dry up than with giving users what they want, but it's the only way to get where we really want to be, says Colin Beveridge.
'Longhorn' is an interesting choice of name for Microsoft�s forthcoming �release of the decade� - its new Windows operating system expected in 2007.
For me the word conjures up childhood television memories of cowboys driving teeming herds of cattle over hostile territory towards inevitable slaughter. Week after week in the 1950s and 60s we watched the western heroes deliver their steers safely to their destiny, regardless of the obstacles put in their way by man and nature.
So perhaps the name was simply chosen to reflect the hardiness, resilience and persistence of longhorn cattle - an apposite analogy for a world-class operating system.
This seems quite plausible. After all, what self-respecting company would want to give a flagship development project a lightweight name?
Everybody knows the importance of a project name as an important flag to rally the troops and allies to the cause, and it is difficult to be original, given the burgeoning list of names already used up by an industry obsessed with snappy project titles.
So Longhorn is as good a name as any for Windows 2007, especially as it could end up as Windows 2008, or even 2009 by the time it is finally released.
But some may prefer to believe that the Longhorn label reveals, albeit subliminally, the software giant’s proprietary attitude to herding millions of cowed computer users on a never-ending stampede towards perpetual financial servitude.
That, though, is a short-sighted if widely held view. As an IT director I often hear people who challenge the need for a new desktop operating system. Their concerns generally fall into two broad categories, as follows.
First, why do we need yet another new PC operating system? Why can’t we just call it quits with further development and stick with XP, or whatever flavour of Linux suits our needs now?
Second, why should we let suppliers such as Microsoft drive us ever onwards, beyond our feature comfort zone in many cases? Why do we need a feature-intensive thick-client operating system in the brave new browser-driven world of web services?
My answers to these questions are well-rehearsed but not, I trust, glib.
I am certain we could all exist quite comfortably for many years to come without any further development of the current generation of PC hardware and software. We already have amazing computing power on our desktops and laptops, power undreamed of when the PC revolution began in the 1970s.
But you can be certain that we would not have seen desktop hardware technology advance if we had not been driven by the growing complexity and capability of the operating system. And to be honest, for the last 20 years that has been entirely down to the steady progress of Windows. A bitter pill for some to swallow perhaps, but true even so.
Mankind needs progress and strives for improvement. It's why we're not driving around in cars with stone wheels or in horse-drawn chariots. Technology moves on, relentlessly, until we can't develop it further. So we do need to keep the operating systems moving on if we want to reap the broader benefits of ever faster, increasingly cheaper and pervasive personal technology. If the software stagnates, so will our overall progress.
And until our infrastructure develops even further, we will continue to need feature-intensive, thick-client operating systems for those people who use their computers for all the tasks that are not yet embedded into fully automated business process control systems. We're still a long way from a fully thin-client vision where all our computing is web-served and we must wait and see whether Longhorn complicates or simplifies the move to such a world.
In the meantime, a few mavericks will doubtless attempt to break away from the herd. Good luck to them: genuine competition is healthy. I just hope that Longhorn delivers the promise we need to progress and that the much maligned Office Assistant paperclip is not replaced with a lasso…
Pozycja IE w swiecie
Microsoft's Internet Explorer global usage share is 94.8 percent according to OneStat.com
Amsterdam - January 19 2004 - OneStat.com ( www.onestat.com ), the number one provider of real-time web analytics, today reported
that Microsoft's Internet Explorer has a total global usage share of 94.8 percent. Microsoft's Internet Explorer continues to dominate the global browser market.
Microsoft's IE 6 is currently the leading browser on the web. Microsoft's IE 6 global usage has increased with 1.8 percent from 66.3 percent to 68.1 percent since July 2003. Mozilla's global usage share is 1.8 percent and Opera 7 has a global usage of 0.8 percent.
The global usage share of Apple's Safari browser has increased with 0.23 percent from 0.25 to 0.48 percent since July 2003.
The most popular browsers on the web are:
1. Microsoft IE 6.0 68.1%
2. Microsoft IE 5.5 13.8%
3. Microsoft IE 5.0 11.8%
4. Mozilla 1.8%
5. Opera 7.0 0.8%
6. Microsoft IE 4.0 0.7%
7. Safari 0.48%
OneStat.com is the number one provider of real-time web site analytics in the world. Our superior technology powers more than 50,000 websites in 100 countries. With our accurate, detailed & reliable reports we will be able to answer questions about visitor behaviour, site performance and retention.
The OneStat.com solutions provide executives, marketers and webmasters with answers to critical e-business questions such as:
· Who is visiting my website?
· How many pageviews, visits (sessions) and visitors are coming on a daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly or yearly basis?
· What content, products, and services do my visitors prefer?
· How many visitors return to the website and how often?
· What kind of search engine do they use?
· What kind of technology do your visitors use to view the website?
· What is the return on investment of my advertising campaigns?
· How do I identify significant trends?
· How much time do they spent on the website?
OneStat.com has the intention to become the number one and provider of real-time website analysis software. The web analytics ASP market totalled $49 million in 2000 and could be worth over $700 million in 2004, according to research agencies.
Methodology: A global usage share of xx percent for browser Y means that xx percent of the visitors of Internet users arrived at sites that are using one of OneStat.com's services by using browser Y. All numbers mentioned in the research are averages of last week and all measurements are normalised to the GMT timezone. Research is based on a sample of 2 million visitors divided into 20,000 visitors of 100 countries each day.
Note for editors: for more information, please contact OneStat.com, Belgieplein 84, 1066 SC Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Phone: +31 (0)20 77 92 544 E-mail: press@onestat.com Website : www.onestat.com
Amsterdam - January 19 2004 - OneStat.com ( www.onestat.com ), the number one provider of real-time web analytics, today reported
that Microsoft's Internet Explorer has a total global usage share of 94.8 percent. Microsoft's Internet Explorer continues to dominate the global browser market.
Microsoft's IE 6 is currently the leading browser on the web. Microsoft's IE 6 global usage has increased with 1.8 percent from 66.3 percent to 68.1 percent since July 2003. Mozilla's global usage share is 1.8 percent and Opera 7 has a global usage of 0.8 percent.
The global usage share of Apple's Safari browser has increased with 0.23 percent from 0.25 to 0.48 percent since July 2003.
The most popular browsers on the web are:
1. Microsoft IE 6.0 68.1%
2. Microsoft IE 5.5 13.8%
3. Microsoft IE 5.0 11.8%
4. Mozilla 1.8%
5. Opera 7.0 0.8%
6. Microsoft IE 4.0 0.7%
7. Safari 0.48%
OneStat.com is the number one provider of real-time web site analytics in the world. Our superior technology powers more than 50,000 websites in 100 countries. With our accurate, detailed & reliable reports we will be able to answer questions about visitor behaviour, site performance and retention.
The OneStat.com solutions provide executives, marketers and webmasters with answers to critical e-business questions such as:
· Who is visiting my website?
· How many pageviews, visits (sessions) and visitors are coming on a daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly or yearly basis?
· What content, products, and services do my visitors prefer?
· How many visitors return to the website and how often?
· What kind of search engine do they use?
· What kind of technology do your visitors use to view the website?
· What is the return on investment of my advertising campaigns?
· How do I identify significant trends?
· How much time do they spent on the website?
OneStat.com has the intention to become the number one and provider of real-time website analysis software. The web analytics ASP market totalled $49 million in 2000 and could be worth over $700 million in 2004, according to research agencies.
Methodology: A global usage share of xx percent for browser Y means that xx percent of the visitors of Internet users arrived at sites that are using one of OneStat.com's services by using browser Y. All numbers mentioned in the research are averages of last week and all measurements are normalised to the GMT timezone. Research is based on a sample of 2 million visitors divided into 20,000 visitors of 100 countries each day.
Note for editors: for more information, please contact OneStat.com, Belgieplein 84, 1066 SC Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Phone: +31 (0)20 77 92 544 E-mail: press@onestat.com Website : www.onestat.com
Munich Linux switch back on - News - ZDNet
, Germany's mayor has decided to push ahead with the LiMux project--which will see 14,000 desktops migrate from Windows to Linux--after it was suspended last week due to legal fears.
Munich's mayor, Christian Ude, had frozen the planned call for bids for the LiMux project after fears surfaced in the City council that a pending EU directive on software patents would wreak havoc with the rollout.
Now, the call for bids is back on and Munich's officials have decided to suspend their legal worries rather than the project. Analyst house Gartner, however, has questioned Munich's party line, saying that TCO concerns were likely to be as much of an issue as software patents. "Gartner does not believe that the EU directive was Munich's primary motivation," the analyst firm said in a research note.
Legal risks mostly come from U.S. patents, and no vendor with relevant patents seems to have shown any interest in threatening or initiating a lawsuit. Instead, the patenting issue may have suggested to Munich that it underestimated costs and risks when calculating the TCO for LiMux."
Munich has asked the EU to explain exactly how patent wrangles could affect its Linux rollout but in the meantime is going ahead with the project, with the patents problems expected to hold back the rollout only for a short time.
Ude has also urged the EU to junk the patents directive
Munich's mayor, Christian Ude, had frozen the planned call for bids for the LiMux project after fears surfaced in the City council that a pending EU directive on software patents would wreak havoc with the rollout.
Now, the call for bids is back on and Munich's officials have decided to suspend their legal worries rather than the project. Analyst house Gartner, however, has questioned Munich's party line, saying that TCO concerns were likely to be as much of an issue as software patents. "Gartner does not believe that the EU directive was Munich's primary motivation," the analyst firm said in a research note.
Legal risks mostly come from U.S. patents, and no vendor with relevant patents seems to have shown any interest in threatening or initiating a lawsuit. Instead, the patenting issue may have suggested to Munich that it underestimated costs and risks when calculating the TCO for LiMux."
Munich has asked the EU to explain exactly how patent wrangles could affect its Linux rollout but in the meantime is going ahead with the project, with the patents problems expected to hold back the rollout only for a short time.
Ude has also urged the EU to junk the patents directive
czwartek, sierpnia 12, 2004
IKE (Internet Key Exchange)
IKE (Internet Key Exchange): "IKE (Internet Key Exchange)
The protocol used to handle encryption keys in IPSec-based VPNs.
IKE performs several functions including authenticating endpoints of VPN tunnels, deciding which encryption and authentication algorithms would be used in a session, generating encryption keys and managing them.
The Internet Engineering Task Force is currently looking at alternatives to IKE, which has a theoretical risk of being used in denial-of-service attacks."
The protocol used to handle encryption keys in IPSec-based VPNs.
IKE performs several functions including authenticating endpoints of VPN tunnels, deciding which encryption and authentication algorithms would be used in a session, generating encryption keys and managing them.
The Internet Engineering Task Force is currently looking at alternatives to IKE, which has a theoretical risk of being used in denial-of-service attacks."
IPsec (IP Security Protocol)
IPsec (IP Security Protocol): "IPSec defines encryption, authentication and key management routines for ensuring the privacy, integrity and authenticity of data in a VPN as the information traverses public IP networks.
Because IPSec requires each end of the tunnel to have a unique address, special care must be taken when implementing IPSec VPNs in environments using private IP addressing based on network address translation. Fortunately, several vendors offer solutions to this problem. However, they add more management complexity."
Because IPSec requires each end of the tunnel to have a unique address, special care must be taken when implementing IPSec VPNs in environments using private IP addressing based on network address translation. Fortunately, several vendors offer solutions to this problem. However, they add more management complexity."
Internet Explorer Documentation
Internet Explorer Documentation
There's lots of great documentation on Internet Explorer available on MSDN. http://msdn.microsoft.com/ie is an excellent place to start. If you have feedback we'd like to hear it. What functionality are you finding difficult to find? What topics would you like covered?
Something worth drawing attention to is the fact that each reference page in the SDK for Internet Explorer has and explicit section for standards. This makes it clear if the attribute, method or element falls within a W3C recommendation or not. I mention this because a couple of times lately I've seen it suggested that Microsoft is deliberately not documenting which parts of Internet Explorer fall within W3C recommendations or not. This is clearly not the case and our reference documentation has contained this information for many years.
For example the AUTOCOMPLETE property is something we support in Internet Explorer. We happen to think that the autocomplete functionality is very useful, however it is not part of a W3C recommendation. So the reference page http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/workshop/author/dhtml/reference/properties/autocomplete.asp states:
Standards Information
This property is a Microsoft extension to HTMLs .
In contrast the ACCESSKEY property that Internet Explorer supports is part of a W3C recommendation and the reference page at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/workshop/author/dhtml/reference/properties/accesskey.asp states:
Standards Information
This property is defined in HTML 4.0 and is defined in World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Document Object Model (DOM) Level 1 .
We think this is useful information so it is included in every reference page. Do let us know if you find any errors in the documentation and if there are things you are looking for that you cannot easily find.
The best place to post feedback is the Internet Explorer Wiki on Channel 9
You are also welcome to place feedback here as well. I do ask that you keep posts polite and respect each others opinion. I have unfortunately already had to remove an abusive and obscene comment.
SDK for IE
There's lots of great documentation on Internet Explorer available on MSDN. http://msdn.microsoft.com/ie is an excellent place to start. If you have feedback we'd like to hear it. What functionality are you finding difficult to find? What topics would you like covered?
Something worth drawing attention to is the fact that each reference page in the SDK for Internet Explorer has and explicit section for standards. This makes it clear if the attribute, method or element falls within a W3C recommendation or not. I mention this because a couple of times lately I've seen it suggested that Microsoft is deliberately not documenting which parts of Internet Explorer fall within W3C recommendations or not. This is clearly not the case and our reference documentation has contained this information for many years.
For example the AUTOCOMPLETE property is something we support in Internet Explorer. We happen to think that the autocomplete functionality is very useful, however it is not part of a W3C recommendation. So the reference page http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/workshop/author/dhtml/reference/properties/autocomplete.asp states:
Standards Information
This property is a Microsoft extension to HTMLs .
In contrast the ACCESSKEY property that Internet Explorer supports is part of a W3C recommendation and the reference page at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/workshop/author/dhtml/reference/properties/accesskey.asp states:
Standards Information
This property is defined in HTML 4.0 and is defined in World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Document Object Model (DOM) Level 1 .
We think this is useful information so it is included in every reference page. Do let us know if you find any errors in the documentation and if there are things you are looking for that you cannot easily find.
The best place to post feedback is the Internet Explorer Wiki on Channel 9
You are also welcome to place feedback here as well. I do ask that you keep posts polite and respect each others opinion. I have unfortunately already had to remove an abusive and obscene comment.
SDK for IE
środa, sierpnia 11, 2004
Piec panstw otrzyma tani Windows
Windows XP Starter Edition – mocno okrojoną wersję XP otrzyma: Malezja, Tajlandia oraz Indonezja pod koniec listopada. MS jeszcze nie wybrał dwóch kolejnych krajów ale mówi się o Rosji i Brazylii lub Jordanii (w niej wzrost inwestycji informatycznych wyniósł od 20 do 400 mnl dolarów w ostatnim roku). Akcja ta wpisuje się w ramowy program (trwający już 18 mc-y) współpracy z rządami krajów rozwijających się mając na celu przybliżenie nowoczesnej technologii z uwzględnieniem specyfiki kulturowej mieszkańcom tych krajów. W ponad 67 rozwijających się krajach wybrane szkoły mają dostęp do upgrade MS Windows i MS Office za 2,50 dol. W MS pracuje w tym programie ponad 600 osób. Cele MS nie są bynajmniej altruistyczne. Obecnie ok. 670 mln ludzi używa PC (1/9 całej ludzkości), a w 2009 będzie ich 1 miliard! Na dodatek tani Windows zniechęci piratów i odeprze atak Linuksa.
MS rzeczywiście okroił Starter Editio – wyposażył je w wygaszacze uwzględniające dany kraj (krajobrazy, flagi, tradycje), nie ma sieci lokalnej oraz jednocześnie można uruchomić trzy programy. Dodatkowo zlokalizował pakiet MS Works. Nie planuje się okrojonej wersji MS Office. Cena jest skalkulowana indywidualnie wg. zasobności danego kraju.
Program już wystartował w Tajlandii – cena 35 dolarów.
Wg. Gatesa nie planuje się wersji dla Chin z uwagi na niższy standard życia, dochodów oraz rozległość terytorialną.
Powyższe trzy kraje nadają się idealnie do eksperymentów z uwagi na gęstość zaludnienia i łączną ilość mieszkańców.
MS rzeczywiście okroił Starter Editio – wyposażył je w wygaszacze uwzględniające dany kraj (krajobrazy, flagi, tradycje), nie ma sieci lokalnej oraz jednocześnie można uruchomić trzy programy. Dodatkowo zlokalizował pakiet MS Works. Nie planuje się okrojonej wersji MS Office. Cena jest skalkulowana indywidualnie wg. zasobności danego kraju.
Program już wystartował w Tajlandii – cena 35 dolarów.
Wg. Gatesa nie planuje się wersji dla Chin z uwagi na niższy standard życia, dochodów oraz rozległość terytorialną.
Powyższe trzy kraje nadają się idealnie do eksperymentów z uwagi na gęstość zaludnienia i łączną ilość mieszkańców.
poniedziałek, sierpnia 09, 2004
Co uzytkownicy chca widziec mowego w IE?
What Users Want in IE Upgrade
Glowne postulaty uzytkownikow odnosnie MS IE (oprocz tych udoskonalen w SP2):
wsparcie pelne CSS
wparcie PNG
zakladki (tabbed interface)
lepszy manager pobierania plikow
czytnik formatow RSS
Glowne postulaty uzytkownikow odnosnie MS IE (oprocz tych udoskonalen w SP2):
wsparcie pelne CSS
wparcie PNG
zakladki (tabbed interface)
lepszy manager pobierania plikow
czytnik formatow RSS
Adam Bosworth's Weblog: KISS and The Mom Factor
Adam Bosworth's Weblog: KISS and The Mom Factor
KISS and The Mom Factor
My new role (I recently moved from BEA to Google) has me working on very different types of software. Rather than worrying about what the IT of large corporations needs to do to support the corporation, I'm worrying about mere mortals. In fact, my Mom. I never find that I can build any software if I don't first get some mental image in my head of the customers. Who are they? How do they look, feel, think? I call this designing by guilt because if you don't do what feels right for these customers, you feel guilty for having let them down. Of course, customers are endlessly disparate, complex, heterogenous, and distinct. But even so, I've always found it necessary to think about a small number of distinct types of customers, and then design for them.
And boy is it satisfying to do this when the people you are designing for are your friends, family, relatives, your smart alec son, and so on and when even your mother can use what you build. I call this the mom factor. It is corny but fun.
It is interesting to me how this focus around simplicity in the services world could carry through even to the plumbing people use. For example take so called web services. The original impetus behind XML, at least as far as I was concerned back in 1996, was a way to exchange data between programs so that a program could become a service for another program. I saw this as a very simple idea. Send me a message of type A and I'll agree to send back messages of types B, C, or D depending on your A. If the message is a simple query, send it as a URL with a query string. In the services world, this has become XML over HTTP much more than so called "web services" with their huge and complex panoply of SOAP specs and standards. Why? Because it is easy and quick. Virtually anyone can build such requests. Heck, you can test them using a browser. That's really the big thing. Anyone can play. You don't have to worry about any of the complexity of WSDL or WS-TX or WS-CO. Since most users of SOAP today don't actually use SOAP standards for reliability (too fragmented) or asynchrony (even more so) or even security (too complex), what are they getting from all this complex overhead. Well, for one, it is a lot slower. The machinery for cracking a query string in a URL is about as fast as one can imagine these days due to the need services have to be quick. The machinery for processing a SOAP request is probably over ten times as slow (that's a guess). Formatting the response, of course, doesn't actually require custom XML machinery. If you can return HTML, you can return XML. It is this sort of thinking that being at a service company engenders. How do you keep it really simple, really lightweight, and really fast. Sure, you can still support the more complex things, but the really useful things may turn out to be simplest ones.
You have to. The scale is orders of magnitudes more than is normally processed by a business process within even the largest corporation. It is hard enough to build these massively scalable services if you keep the moving parts simple, clear, and down to a small number. This is usually called the KISS principle as in keep it simple and stupid or, more rudely, keep it simple, stupid. It reflects the engineering realization that just delivering on the required speed and scale will require a lot of plumbing and monitoring as it is.
So, I'm having a lot of fun learning about a whole new world.
Trudno sie z tym nie zgodzic...
KISS and The Mom Factor
My new role (I recently moved from BEA to Google) has me working on very different types of software. Rather than worrying about what the IT of large corporations needs to do to support the corporation, I'm worrying about mere mortals. In fact, my Mom. I never find that I can build any software if I don't first get some mental image in my head of the customers. Who are they? How do they look, feel, think? I call this designing by guilt because if you don't do what feels right for these customers, you feel guilty for having let them down. Of course, customers are endlessly disparate, complex, heterogenous, and distinct. But even so, I've always found it necessary to think about a small number of distinct types of customers, and then design for them.
And boy is it satisfying to do this when the people you are designing for are your friends, family, relatives, your smart alec son, and so on and when even your mother can use what you build. I call this the mom factor. It is corny but fun.
It is interesting to me how this focus around simplicity in the services world could carry through even to the plumbing people use. For example take so called web services. The original impetus behind XML, at least as far as I was concerned back in 1996, was a way to exchange data between programs so that a program could become a service for another program. I saw this as a very simple idea. Send me a message of type A and I'll agree to send back messages of types B, C, or D depending on your A. If the message is a simple query, send it as a URL with a query string. In the services world, this has become XML over HTTP much more than so called "web services" with their huge and complex panoply of SOAP specs and standards. Why? Because it is easy and quick. Virtually anyone can build such requests. Heck, you can test them using a browser. That's really the big thing. Anyone can play. You don't have to worry about any of the complexity of WSDL or WS-TX or WS-CO. Since most users of SOAP today don't actually use SOAP standards for reliability (too fragmented) or asynchrony (even more so) or even security (too complex), what are they getting from all this complex overhead. Well, for one, it is a lot slower. The machinery for cracking a query string in a URL is about as fast as one can imagine these days due to the need services have to be quick. The machinery for processing a SOAP request is probably over ten times as slow (that's a guess). Formatting the response, of course, doesn't actually require custom XML machinery. If you can return HTML, you can return XML. It is this sort of thinking that being at a service company engenders. How do you keep it really simple, really lightweight, and really fast. Sure, you can still support the more complex things, but the really useful things may turn out to be simplest ones.
You have to. The scale is orders of magnitudes more than is normally processed by a business process within even the largest corporation. It is hard enough to build these massively scalable services if you keep the moving parts simple, clear, and down to a small number. This is usually called the KISS principle as in keep it simple and stupid or, more rudely, keep it simple, stupid. It reflects the engineering realization that just delivering on the required speed and scale will require a lot of plumbing and monitoring as it is.
So, I'm having a lot of fun learning about a whole new world.
Trudno sie z tym nie zgodzic...
niedziela, sierpnia 08, 2004
To jest już wojna
Forbes.com: This is WarInside Microsoft Taylor is building a network of information and relationships aimed at overpowering the rival operating system. His attack spans multiple levels of the Redmond, Wash. empire: product development, marketing, sales and even customer demonstrations. In a building where Microsoft hosts trial runs of its software for customers, Taylor now has 50 servers out of 500 devoted to Linux.
IDC offers sunny forecast for servers - News - ZDNet
IDC offers sunny forecast for servers - News - ZDNet
Raport IDG z 16 czerwca przewiduje stały wzrost na rynku serwerów. Na postawie bieżącego trendu przewiduje się znaczny wzrost - rocznie o około 3.8% tak, że w 2008 wartość rynku serwerów dojdzie do kwoty 61 mld dolarów. Szybkiej wzrośnie segment "blade server" - dostarczy w 2008 roku 9 mld dol. co mu da 30% udział na rynku wszystkich serwerów. Szczególnie silny wzrost będzie miał miejsce w segmencie serwerów bazujących na architekturze x86. Podział rynku serwerów według systemów operacyjnych: 30% - Linux-based (10 mld dol.), natomiast 60% wszystkich sprzedanych serwerów będzie należało do Windows-based.
Raport IDG z 16 czerwca przewiduje stały wzrost na rynku serwerów. Na postawie bieżącego trendu przewiduje się znaczny wzrost - rocznie o około 3.8% tak, że w 2008 wartość rynku serwerów dojdzie do kwoty 61 mld dolarów. Szybkiej wzrośnie segment "blade server" - dostarczy w 2008 roku 9 mld dol. co mu da 30% udział na rynku wszystkich serwerów. Szczególnie silny wzrost będzie miał miejsce w segmencie serwerów bazujących na architekturze x86. Podział rynku serwerów według systemów operacyjnych: 30% - Linux-based (10 mld dol.), natomiast 60% wszystkich sprzedanych serwerów będzie należało do Windows-based.
Nowa wersja korporacyjnego Linuxa rozpoczyna testy
Free corporate Linux set for test phase - News - ZDNet: "peeved "
Znany działacz FOSS Peres oznajmił na LinuxWorld Expo, że przygotował nową wersję Linuxa zorientowaną na rynek serwerów korporacyjnych. Nazywa się UserLinux i ma konkurować z dwiema wersjami z tego obszaru zastosowań Linuxa: RedHat (użytkownik płaci od 300 dolarów roczniej za wsparcie) oraz SuSE (cena opieki rocznej - 350 dolarów). Im wydajniejsza platforma sprzętowa tym opieka jest droższa.
UserLinux ma być znacznie tańszy. Powodem zorganizowania nowej dystrybucji Linuxa (opartej na Debianie) jest rozdrażnienie Peresa faktem, że RH sprzedaje oprogramownie systemowe w skład którego wchodzi program napisany przez niego samego (Electric Fence) za pieniądze.
Pakiet UserLinux wejdzie na rynek we wrześniu. Jedynym hamulcem jest proces certyfikacji samego systemu i wchodzących w skład dystrybucji dodatków. Przewiduje się uzyskanie certyfikatów na poziomie zgodności z Linux Standard Base.
Znany działacz FOSS Peres oznajmił na LinuxWorld Expo, że przygotował nową wersję Linuxa zorientowaną na rynek serwerów korporacyjnych. Nazywa się UserLinux i ma konkurować z dwiema wersjami z tego obszaru zastosowań Linuxa: RedHat (użytkownik płaci od 300 dolarów roczniej za wsparcie) oraz SuSE (cena opieki rocznej - 350 dolarów). Im wydajniejsza platforma sprzętowa tym opieka jest droższa.
UserLinux ma być znacznie tańszy. Powodem zorganizowania nowej dystrybucji Linuxa (opartej na Debianie) jest rozdrażnienie Peresa faktem, że RH sprzedaje oprogramownie systemowe w skład którego wchodzi program napisany przez niego samego (Electric Fence) za pieniądze.
Pakiet UserLinux wejdzie na rynek we wrześniu. Jedynym hamulcem jest proces certyfikacji samego systemu i wchodzących w skład dystrybucji dodatków. Przewiduje się uzyskanie certyfikatów na poziomie zgodności z Linux Standard Base.
Monachium mówi NIE, ale Fraknfurt - TAK
Munich breaks with Windows for Linux - News - ZDNet: "The software giant pointed to a new agreement it had signed with Frankfurt, under which the German city joined a Microsoft program that offered products to German local governments under 'inexpensive and flexible terms.' Frankfurt Mayor Petra Roth said in a statement that the city will save money as a result of the deal"
Okazuje się, że Frankfurt dał się namówić na pozostanie w środowisku Windows w ramach programu MS skierowanego do niemieckich lokalnych administracji.
Okazuje się, że Frankfurt dał się namówić na pozostanie w środowisku Windows w ramach programu MS skierowanego do niemieckich lokalnych administracji.
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