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Cringely on StarOffice, W2k, Alpha & more 185

Posted by Hemos from the bringing-it-all-together dept.
Shturmovik[KGB] gave us the hook-up for the latest piece by Cringely. Bob does what columnists are supposed to do-ties together all the disparate news that's been happening and makes a convincing argument about a certain-company being off the tracks.
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Cringely on StarOffice, W2k, Alpha & more More

Cringely on StarOffice, W2k, Alpha & more

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  • Good article, and this could be as significant as he seems to think. But like others he seems sure that the Sun Community Source License qualifies for open source. Sun themselves, on their licensing page [sun.com] say that it is not. The license has definite drawbacks that will drastically reduce the number of developers attracted, unless I haven't been paying attention.

    Can't we somehow convince Sun that for this particular project even something like Mozilla's NPL would be more productive? The same licensing page referenced above shows that Sun doesn't seem to like the bazaar model much, so perhaps not.

    Jim

  • Re:M$ (Score:1)

    by deno ( 814 )
    Yup, it is from "boot"
    http://www.dcs.napier.ac.uk/~st7003/trap/linux/lin us_torvalds_interview.htm
  • oh well i forgot there is actually a 32 bit digital unix and a 64 bit one... they have about the same functionality...

    but in response to cringley's thinking compaq will drop it in favor of linux... that is a LLLLooooong shot! there is no way they will drop there installed user base like that... big mistake.
  • Remember when Novell owned the server market, or Netscape owned the browser market? Or what a disaster Windows was until 3.0?

    I share your feelings about Microsoft's technology, but what keeps them in the game - apart from money - is their tenacity when they have a target in their sights, and the surprising nimbleness of such a large company to turn around when they need to. Of course the money is a huge factor, since it allows them to fight these loss-leader wars of attrition and win.

    The landscape may be changing, but I wouldn't discount Microsoft's ability to evolve [just] fast enough to keep up...
  • Yes, he is exagerrating. Much closer to 0%
  • It may be that folk are just too impatient, also. I expect that Mozilla will come crawling out of the woodwork any week (month?) now (M11 is said to be the first target end-user release -- M9 is the current version, and was not expected to be useable). At that point thing may start to move a bit faster (parallel debugging).
  • But perhaps if they release the source, someone else will get it to work for them. They probably won't GPL it, but their "Community License" seems to have created some features which were offered back to Java (it didn't take many of them, but they were certainly studied with interest -- check-out the Pizza compiler and Kiev). This without any attempt on their part to solicit contributions.
    It's too bad that they wouldn't use the GPL, I don't like the "Community License" very much, but it's obviously better than the average one (which I typify as): "What ever bad happens, it's your fault, we get the credit for anything good. If we decide we don't like your looks, we get to take the software back. And if you complain, then win or loose you pay all legal expenses, and any resulting fine or other penalty."
  • There is no way I would be reading this flame war if "SoftwareJanitor" weren't magically privileged.

    I didn't ask to be 'magically privileged'. I'm not even sure what the mechanism is for getting auto-moderated up or down. Maybe there needs to be a facility that you can specifically exclude an account if you don't want to read them (maybe there already is -- I don't remember, as I haven't looked recently). Maybe there needs to be a way for those of us who are 'magically blessed' to choose to post at a lower level if we want, or maybe instead of 'auto-blessing' every post, we should get a pool of self-moderating points we can spend on posts to make us decide which ones we think are most important.

    However, if you really don't want to read 'flame wars' (and this really doesn't qualify as such in the scheme of things), then you can always excercise your browser's scroll bar or your down arrow key. Nobody forces you to read on once you get to the first message in a 'flame war' thread.

  • For all users, not just business users, AOL (who are kinda close to Sun these days) plan to distribute it as standard on all their CDs. Compaq are apparantly going to pre-installed it on some of their PCs, and others might follow.

    Also, Sun will be launching their next-gen "JavaStation" in about 5-6 days, I believe.

    You can download StarOffice 5.1 for free here [sun.com] - support for Solaris SPARC/Intel, Linux, OS/2, Windows 95/98/NT, and several languages. Unfortunately, you do have to register, but if you've already got a username/password for say the Java (or Solaris) Developers Connection then you can use that.

    And finally, Sun will be making available Solaris 8 early access [sun.com] - ie open beta to the public, for the first time for a new version of Solaris. You'll probably see the source code available later...

  • I have to agree...I don't think that anyone will assert that the computer/OS/tech field in general has been static for the past 20 years, and yet Microsoft has been able to advance and remain on top. They are able to adapt, but I think it's natural to try to control as much as possible so you don't have to adapt. But they are going to rest on the laurels...their free ISP service is going to be the first of I am sure many attempts to stake a dominant claim to the internet. Now I am not saying that this is a good thing mind you, but they are a corporation after all and Sun, the Open Source Community etc have the same right but maybe not the same warchest.........
  • Meeja, Meeja, Meeja. It is so utterly
    different from desktop bloatware as to be no
    more than a mere joke - if it weren't for the
    fact that it may be true...

    WinCE on my telly?? My mother wouldn't approve
    of that, when the blue screen appears - or what
    of the couch potatoes watching a blue screening:
    will they care about the 'my computer' icon
    top-left? I don't think so.
    --------------------------------------------
  • I agree hopefully the Open Sourcing of Star Office will allow it to be re-done quicker and have less overhead.

    >Where'd we ever lose the UNIX mantra of, "Do One >Thing and Do It Well"? :-(

    As opposed to Microsoft's "Do everything, or at least crash trying to."
  • So MS should stick to their core business, desktops and should not wander into distributed computing? Besides, Sun's core busniness is Unix systems, networking just comes with that turf as a natural sidekick. They haven't wandered an inch. -M

  • Re:Microsoft will be reborn...not likely (Score:3)

    by RenQuanta ( 3274 ) on Friday September 03, 1999 @01:46AM (#1707517) Homepage
    They've been trying ever since the browser wars, with no success. Remember MSN? Neither do I. Then there's Hotmail, (what security hole?) and Ebay (sinusoidal behavior makes its debut on the Internet). The big players to be taken seriously on the Internet do not include Microsoft. They've failed miserably because the rules of the game have changed, and they're stuck with what made them what they are.

    As Cringley's well-written article points out, the MS strategy no longer applies. Close standards which take advantage of market forces (PCs becoming the dominant hardware standard) is one thing when the technology is a stand-alone box. When the technology hinges upon the Internet, ie communication between many people, closed standards will always be ignored for open ones. It's simply the nature of the environment.

    For MS to reinvent itself enough to survive in the Internet Age, they must inevitably abandon all that has made them profitable. Money is the only thing keeping the company in the game, it certainly isn't technological or innovative prowess. Their current dominance in office productivity software will not save them, Star Office being offered free will do to them what they did to Netscape (what sweet irony it is). Even better yet, a coordinated triumverate between StarOffice, WordPerfect Suite, and Applixware will but speed up the process. It is simply a matter of time before the Darwinian nature of the industry makes Microsoft the dinosaur of the PC industry.

  • On an unrelated front, the Hotmail fiasco is turning out to be a black eye for them, as well. Mistakes happen, but they clearly left the servers running well after everyone and his dog was raiding other peoples' accounts. (There's an article in Salon [salon1999.com] by someone who read about it in CNN, found the URL on /. and read the mail of a woman who took her boyfriend. How many other incidents like that were there? Hundreds? Thousands?)

    And then their PR campaign erred too far on the side of understatement. Reading stories in the mainstream press, it sounds like that business about "required an advanced knowledge of web development language" came across as condescending and blatantly untrue.

  • That's unfortunately true. OTOH, it's a lot cheaper. The question for me is going to be "How does it stack up against ApplixWare, KOffice, WordPerfect?"

    I'm not too pleased with the way that it does tables of contents or indicies, but then I'm not too happy with the current version of word either. I rather liked the way that Mac Word 5.1 did it, although it sure would have been nice to have multiple versions the way WordPerfect used to let you (the last version that I tried didn't seem to have this still available.. that was unfortunate).
    ...
    <rest of ramble deleted>

    I do have high standards for word processors. Unfortunately, MSWord has been going backwards with respect to them recently. The only recent addition that I liked was the interactive speller. OTOH, the interactive grammarian was... <Snarl>It sure would be nice if it had some clue as to what it was doing!! </Snarl>

    We need a word processor that developes in the direction of peoples needs rather than in the direction of what can be marketed!
  • Then there's also stuff like IBM's remote AWT which lets you write your app initially as a fat client, and without changing your source code at all, you can also use it remotely from a server and direct the GUI to a very thin client.

    That would give the end user an option of either using the fat or thin client. With no additional costs to the developer.

    Has anybody ever tried it?

  • I was referring specifically to standards for word processing, spreadsheets, presentation software, etc. I'm already 100% behind existing standards.
  • Behold! The new Web-based StarOffice written entirely in Java!
    Now with the UltraSlow[tm] technology that makes it even more difficult to use.
    New additions include InstantCore[tm] for faster and better coredumps..

    Let's face it; web-based StarOffice is a bad idea, but the idea of running applications remotely is good.

    .. but wait.. where have I seen that before? Hmmm..
  • isn't fully MSOffice compliant == unusable

    That depends on your needs. I don't really have a need to be 'fully MSOffice compliant'. I find StarOffice to be usable for my needs, other than being a little bit hungry on the resource requirements side (which is a fully MSOffice compliant feature). For that matter, between different versions of MSOffice, they are often only one directionally compliant.

  • What our anonymous friend overlooks is that you do not need to run all of StarOffice in the browser, just a remote GUI front end to StarOffice.

    So you take the existing StarOffice GUI interface, make a java applet "display server" paired to an interface library for StarOffice, and voila, you're in business.

    And on top of that, you get a chunk of software usable for other things...

  • I personally can't wait for it to be opened up. Star Office seams like a much superior product then microsoft office. Just needs some rough edges cleaned up. But being able to run cross platform, and system independant is a true "Office" Application.

    Have they released the sources to this beast yet?
  • Errr...factoring prime numbers isn't NP-complete. It's trivial - the factors are 1 and the number itself.

    Factoring the product of two large primes is the difficult problem.

  • I think Linux has had plenty of time already. As I said, the UI is the biggest problem, but there are others, and most are inherent in the design of Linux. It is geek-friendly, not user-friendly.

    That is both good and bad.

    I will be surprised and impressed if Linux can deliver on the UI front. I'm not just talking about how it draws fonts and that sort of thing. I mean things like how it handles keyboard shortcuts across applications, and all the little things that make a UI complete, and above all else, *intuitive.*

    Then it has to tackle the ease-of-use problems.

    -WW

    --
    Why are there so many Unix-using Star Trek fans?
    When was the last time Picard said, "Computer, bring

  • Or maybe Compaq will save the best parts of True64 and put them on Linux, which is similar to the survival strategy being embraced right now by SGI.

    Heh heh heh.... This would be a great trend.

    Can anyone enumerate any benefits that True64 could bring to Linux? I mean, with SGI giving a journaled file system to Linux, they are making Linux much more attractive to buisnesses who want to use Linux in enterprise servers. What benefits would True64 be able to share?

  • StarOffice rules, i love it.
    I definately don't agree that just because it's not M$Office compliant that it's unusable, in fact i think that's what makes it so great - it's by time we started a new standard for word processing. No more storage of massive binary data, use something editable by an ASCII editer, like LaTeX, sure it takes up more space, but that isn't as much an issue as it once was.
    Don't know if StarOffice uses binary data that bad or not, but i know that M$Office uses it like it's going out of style.
    I read an interview in Boot i think, last issue before they went to MaximumPC or whatever, where they interviewed Linus, and i distinctly remember a remark he made on people sending him docs in word format, he said something simple to the effect of "i send it back". don't have a link, don't know if it's archived somewhere, if someone knows, please post it.
    well that's my $.02
  • The concept is great. There are lots of organizations that want office suites, collaborative software and centralized databases, but they don't have the resources and expertise to run a serious network.


    If you were say, a gov't office, you could buy a ton of thin clients and contract out the operations. If a thin client breaks, buy a new one.


    There are lots of issues about security and the appropriateness of the architecture model to
    the organization, but on the whole it's the way to go.

  • >Think a year or so ahead, where cable modems are more ubiquitous, and Microsoft has continued to build up influential inventment positions in a large
    >number of cable companies.

    But you still come back to quality of content.

    And the folks who choose this sort of stuff for a living right now screw it up *way* more often than they get it right. Or get screwed over by change in fashion, change in fads, or change in advertisers.

    MS will wish for the days when all they had to worry about was buggy code.


    Geoff
  • Compaq engineers quietly admit that Linux on Alpha runs better than Compaq's own Unix.

    Well.. maybe, but AFAIK the compilers available for Linux still lacks good optimization for the Alpha.
    (Doesn't the standard libraries need to be optimized too?)

    Please don't hesitate to correct me if I'm wrong.. my statements are based on somthing I think I read somewhere a while ago..
  • They'll gain a bigger user base than they'll drop. Fewer and fewer companies are adding more 'closed-Unix' servers. They'll add more new customers than they'll lose by switching to Linux. And it's not like anyone is saying to drop support of their unix. Digital Unix is great, but Linux is moving faster -- why not just add Digital functionality to Linux and use that, getting all the current Linux momentum?

    That's what SGI is betting on!

  • Hmmm, I think you have hit the nail right on the head, at least in McNealy's view.

    Sun would love nothing more than to have fat servers and thin clients as the new computing model, especially if it's _their_ fat servers running the show. In that world, who cares what the client OS is? Sun has given up on the desktop and if Linux helps to clear MS away from the pesky PC market so much the better. It's easier for Linux to communicate with cousin Solaris on the big fat servers than it is for MS-anything and Sun knows it.

    If Linux helps clear the PCs of MS and allows Sun to concentrate on the big fat servers the Sun gods will be as happy as swines in excrement.

    Onto the next monopoly. This one's getting old.

    -M
  • DEC (err ... Compaq) has C and Fortran compiler technology that is better than GCC, for the Alpha that is. I'd love to see the optimizations available in those compilers move into the GNU tools.

  • Re:M$ (Score:1)

    by be-fan ( 61476 )
    LaTex surly uses its own formatting codes in its ASCII text. The problem with ASCII is that you will have a nice big format if you want ASCII text to be able to hold pictures, and all the cool formatting stuff that people (especially WordPerfect users) have become accostomed to using.
  • Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't XML (already) supported as a standard file format in Office 2000?
  • Wouldn't MS be pissed if some big-name manufacturers start installing Star Office instead of the MS Office Suite? I'm not sure that any would do that, because it would piss off MS, but smaller companies and white box manufacturers could install it at no cost and make their customers happy also.
  • As I remember on the Slashdot post about 64 bit NT (It runs now!!!) GCC produces pretty unoptimized output for the Alpha. From that end I find it very hard to belive that Linxu outperforms Tru64. Besides, this guys a columnist, you think he knows what he is talking about? Get rid of Tru64 and you have basically killed the Alpha as a decent platform.
  • Microsoft owns WebTV.
  • Tell that to HP, they make everything from processors, to printers to stethescopes. I doubt they started making all those products, they expanded. And if you think HP is unsuccessfull, I'll be glade to take any stock you may have off your hands.
  • I'd like to point out that, MS is not the first one to play the online media company role, unlike what they did in X86 desktops. Don't you see AOL is AIM'ing microsofe pretty good, AOL has the leverage to force people to upgrade to an entirely different AIM if it want. Not to mention that AOL runs promotion and FUD as good as M$.

    And the free ISP thing is a joke, everybody offers it now, there's another ISP offering the exact 3 years deal with eMachine (damn if I remember who) aol is keep sending you "another 2 free months" CD after you quick, And none of them is that much better that netzero, with free pop3. If I want to pay for the ISP, I want cable connection.

    M$ still hasn't put anything intelligent into the home electronic device, I guess Billg doesn't like sushi.

    CY
  • Their current dominance in office productivity
    software will not save them, Star Office being offered free will do to them what they did to
    Netscape (what sweet irony it is)


    Don't forget when IE was being offer free, it was inferior to Netscape, but SUN doesn't has a OS to push it to people's mouth though. I guess they will have to "intergrade" it to the applidviewer hehe.


    CY
  • haven't Compaq opened the source of their True64 compiler a while ago

    I haven't heard anything about that; do you have a reference?

    Have it been ported under Linux since then?

    That appears to be in progress; this page [compaq.com] says:

    We've added Compaq's beta FORTRAN for Alpha Linux to this website and it's getting rave reviews from test drivers! Register for the test drive today and check it out! COMING SOON: SuSe Linux on Alpha and Proliant and Compaq's beta C Compiler--optimized for Alpha Linux
  • Shows how difficult it is to get it right. Even though his numbers don't seem believable. Do you think Sun will be able to get it right if MS can't? Even with the "full on power" and "superiority" of the Open Source movement?
  • Superior? The version I downloaded looked pretty darned amateurish to me ... and rather feature-limited.

    Usability is key with an Office Suite. Sun has never built a user-friendly app and they never will. As far as usability goes, MS has it figured out better than any company out there.

  • If real email clients are so cheap, why have Web-based email? Access from anywhere and ease of entry for the beginning user.

    After you've spent an hour or two helping a writer friend get Office installed and patched and running and help him to navigate past the paper clip doing its "Welcome to Word" routine you (and him) really wish he could dial-in to somewhere and have a fully-functional up-to-date office app to run that's administered remotely. There are lots of people right now acting as their own sysadmins because they have to. They'd love an alternative where they get to just use the system.

    Plus, even in America, something like half the adult population doesn't even use a computer yet. These people are not going to be screwing around with a Windows PC just to run Office, no matter how cheap the PC is. If they can boot up a terminal that always works and get a word processor that always works, they'll do some word processing. That's a big, untapped market.
  • Amen! I LOVE Linux, BUT...Until it gets the productivity apps (StarOffice has a LONG way to go to top off97 in terms of Programmability, User Interface (if I don't like ActiveDesktop why the would I like an office suite taking over my desktop like Staroffice wants to?), IMNSHO, Linux needs: Consistent GUI GREAT IDE (unless you can convince newbie programmers that it's easier to program on a Linux boxen than say VB 5.0, your not going to attract the new programmers and Ideas Linux needs) Decent MTA, I single this out because there simply doesn't seem to be an "Outlook" or "Lotus Notes" killer MTA for Linux. On average most Home users spend a significant portion of their time in email. They want a friendly, stable, MTA that can read the HTML mail that looks so "keen". Super Webbrowser. Your home user lives in email and their Webbrowser when they aren't playing games. Netscape/Mozilla are still VERY buggy (if I get one more prompt bitching about multiple sessions I'm gonna scream) OPERA is a good competitor, but can it compete with IE? As bloated and convoluted as IE is, it's still got the majority of the market, so any competitor will have to plan not breaking support for it if they expect Home users to go for it. Better Hardware support. USB, Better P-n-P (much as I hate it, it's the defacto standard for new hardware). Better Printer Support. While looking for a Printer for my Linux box I was dismayed at the lack of choice (due to Manufacturer's not providing Linux Drivers). This will most likely have to come from the Printer manufacturer's as companies like Lexmark aren't going to release their API's anytime soon I'd love to see Linux Desktops rule the market, but until some very intensive effort is devoted to the core issues with using Linux as a desktop machine I don't look for it.
  • VMS had clustering superior to any current Unix offering back in 1985. Of course, VMS has not been standing still in clustering technology.

    Check out OpenVMS Galaxies [digital.com]. An integration of clustering and SMP that allows you to take advantage of the best of both!

    OpenVMS also has the same superior language compilers as Tru64.

  • I work for Compaq (formerly Digital) in the ZKO facility, which does a large portion of the operating system work. We also recently had a visit from our CEO. I think it's safe to say that Tru64 (not "True64") Unix will be here to stay for quite a while. There are a bunch of people here who work with Linux for Compaq or just at home (like me). Linux will not replace Tru64 Unix (as far as Compaq is concerned) anytime in the near future. Both products will be in use: Tru64 Unix is being targeted at much higher end areas with capibilities such as TruCluster (what I work on) and Linux is for "normal" size servers or desktops. Most of the work going on is to make sure Linux and Tru64 Unix play well together, not to drop one or the other. In fact, we'll even be keeping OpenVMS around for quite some time.

    Our new CEO is big on "enterprise level computing", which to him/Compaq means high-end Alphas running Tru64 Unix, possibly in large, highly-available clusters. Ask maddog sometime about Tru64 Unix; he'll probably agree that in many areas it is better than Linux from a "computer science" point of view.

    (Flame gear on)
  • Nice try astroturfer. Sun is giving away an Office Suite that competes with 50% of M$'s business. They are doing to M$ what M$ did to Netscape. What goes around comes around.
  • The point you are missing here is user level and root level. At least thats my take...the worst it could do is take down that specific user. Maybe rm -rf his home dir or something along those lines. Windows (nt et all) have never had the concept of user level and root level security implemented very well. Another reason that it wouldnt be as effective is userspace and kernel space. Programs from Microsoft are so integrated into kernelspace (for "ease of use") that its scary. Of course I could be talking out of my ass but then again I dont use staroffice to read my mail. Emacs works just fine ;)
  • isn't XML (already) supported as a standard file format in Office 2000?


    Microsoft's semi-proprietary almost-XML, more likely.

  • Tru64 UNIX V5 and TruCluser V5 (Score:3)

    by Macka ( 9388 ) on Friday September 03, 1999 @02:18AM (#1707564)
    I've just done a 2 day intro course on these products and based on what I've learned I'd have
    to say that chucking out the Tru64 kernel and replacing it with Linux is IMO not yet an option.

    This is the biggest leap in technology that Tru64 has made during it's life so far, and the jewel in the crown for V5 has got to be the new filesystem, CFS (Cluster File System).

    With CFS, not only can every system in the cluster see all the devices on the shared SCSI bus, but also all the devices on all the private SCSI buses too. When one system mounts a device, this appears in the mount table for all the cluster members.

    The thing is that CFS is bound so closely to UNIX V5 and the kernel, that even on a standalone V5 system with no clustering there are tell tale signs that dormant cluster software is waiting with hooks at the ready. You can see this in the file system. For example an ls -l of /etc/binlog.conf shows:

    binlog.conf -> ../cluster/members/{memb}/etc/binlog.conf

    Btw, {memb} is something new too. It's called a CDSL (context dependant symbolic link) and in this case resolves to "member0", changing the number where the cluster member number is different.

    While I'm at this I can't resist telling you how clusters are installed, cos this was really neat too.

    When installing a cluster you start off with one disk, which can be either local or shared, and install Tru64 UNIX on that. Then install the TruCluster software and select two disks on the shared SCSI, one for the Cluster disk and one for the system (member0) boot disk. When you run "clu_create" Tru64 UNIX is copyied from your current disk to the cluster disk and the boot disk containing the root f/s for member0. You then shutdown and boot of the boot disk. Hey presto, you're a 1 system cluster. The first disk you used can be junked now and reused for something else.

    Want to add more members? No problem. You need to assign boot disks for each one, then run clu_add_member for each system. A system specific root is added to each, and member specific directories are setup on the common Cluster Disk. At this point you could take all your new systems out of their boxes, cable them up (though in practice you'd have done this first) power them on and then boot them straight off their new boot disks. No installation needed :-)

    The whole process is so quick we reckoned we could install and cluster of 4 x DS20's from scratch in about 1.5 hours.

    I could ramble on now about the new System Management Station, that can be driven from a curses front end, a CDE GUI front end, or even a Java version of the CDE GUI from a Web browser. I could wax lyrical about the dynamicly updated pictorial system maps of the systems, their devices, buses, cluster members, etc, the new Event Manager, and lots of other things. But I reckon I've taken up enough of your time.

    To wrap up I'd like to say that I think it would be very cool (and cost effective in the long term) if the Linux kernel could replace Tru64's. But I don't see that happening just yet, not for the next couple of years anyway.

    Macka
  • Just because theres no Windoze support
    doesnt mean thateveryone will put Linux on it, Sales will undoubtadly be
    poor as a result of M$'s announcement. I wouldnt see it as a victory for linux just yet.
    Maybe the small few new users alpha can now expect to get will run Linux....
  • I couldn't agree more. Look at Novell PerfectOffice for a recent example of this. Sun can't even get client-side Java working to a run anything more than trivial bouncing head programs. This is true even on their own platform!!! Sun is up in the night if they think they can compete with M$ in this area. Sun's obesession with M$ is going to be their undoing.
  • Not if they saw an supermarket ad that sells the box 40% cheaper because they private windows --yea, a lot of little shop here in ny don't pay windows license and don't give you a windows CD, more than ebay anyway.

    CY
  • Here in my collect, a lot of people download the whole fscking (20meg?) aol trail just to read their email -just to read their email, despite the fact that AOL does provide a webbase email software. You think people are smart?

    I don't understand why the admins don't junkbuster it though.
  • Fine.

    MS will be hard pressed to not support it if users demand it.

    And if they do try to use WebTV's dominance in it's niche to squeeze out the competition and force acceptance of their own alternative, that could ultimately end up backfiring and being a boon for consumers by opening the doors to competitors in the set-top-box/internet-appliance space.

    Come to think of it, it might be just the opening that a certain near-mythical ancient computer platform that's had some recent sightings on slashdot needs. Granted they haven't produced any significant products in ages, but something is going on behind the scenes, as evidenced by numerous fairly recent patents, mostly relating to set-top boxes.

    ---
    vilvoy
  • > Linux is NOT a threat to Microsoft (or any user-friendly OS maker) at the *consumer level* until it is re-designed from the ground up to be USER-FRIENDLY.



    User-friendliness has nothing to do with it. Windows is extraordinarily user-hostile, overly complex and appallingly obscure, but it benefits from one key fact: it comes preloaded on PCs, as a result of which prospective users don't have to go through the utterly user-unfriendly Windows installation procedure. If you put Windows and Linux head-to-head in front of a computer-unaware beginner with the goal of installing exactly the same feature set, Windows would be so far behind that it wouldn't even figure on the user-friendly map.



    Don't flatter Microsoft with a "user-friendly" label. It's not. Their horrid product is just preloaded, and Linux isn't.

  • You mean 32bit NT with a few 64bit extensions? :)
  • footnote: early versions of OSF/1 (aka "Digital Unix", aka "tru64") were available for MIPS hardware. still have a tape somewhere...

    ...but that was long before they changed the name to Digital Unix.

  • What is the market share breakdown of "webTV"
    companies? I do believe WebTV has the biggest
    market.

    -WW

    --
    Why are there so many Unix-using Star Trek fans?
    When was the last time Picard said, "Computer, bring
  • There are two approaches to writing, say, an office app in Java: just rewrite the whole thing and have all of that run in the JVM on the client machine (which may be unplugged from the net at that point), or write it such that most of the crunching takes place on the server and the client side is just a smart user interface (something like the X Windows model but at a higher level).

    Corel (AFAIK) tried the former, and at a stage when the Java language and JVM technology was in its infancy (no JIT, etc). It bombed. I don't know that Sun is taking the latter approach, but if they want to sell servers that's the way I'd bet. That could be very workable indeed. (I've done apps like this, where the core logic, data storage, etc took place on a Unix server but the GUI ran on an NT workstation. It's a very workable model.)
    Since Sun is talking about having this stuff run in e.g. Java-enable cell phones, the later is almost certainly the model they're using.

  • What is going to happen to Applixware? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Now that Star Office is free and psuedo Open Sourced how can the Office Suite Applixware hope to compete?

    What Linux user in their right mind is going to buy Applixware now?

    I plan on downloading and using Star Office on my Linux box and I want to thank Sun for their generosity.

    Now what scares me is how Open Source is being used as a weapon, thats not what it's about, or is it? The target was Microsoft but I'm afraid a lot of the little commercial developers are going to be taken out first.

    IMO Linux needs more commercial developers and tactics like the Star Office move will only scare them away, it's like poisoning the water hole. Some of the extremists may argue that this is a good thing, I don't believe it is.
  • It has attracted some developers, and will attract more to bugfix, etc once it is released or nearly released.

    If Sun goes by a proper open source license but keeps developing under their current style then that is a good thing. Even if no extra developers joined it's still good having the source as it'll make it easier for interested parties to submit bugfixes later or port to their preferred platform. Less people will bother even bug fixing if it's not a proper open source license
    --
  • I'm looking VERY hopefully to cut the number of future licenses I'm purchasing of MS Office (We have about 80 at the moment) by using Star Office.

    After a couple of days of using it to write the same documentation that I do in Word, it's just not there yet. The best I can hope for, for now is that I can use Star Office for the non-essential users, and continue to use MS Office for the users who need the power.

    I was excited at first, but I'm starting to see why the analysts say this is not a threat to MS Office (sigh).

    I'm down, but I'm not out on this one...
  • He made some good points, but others weren't so good.

    For instance, he talks about WebTV:

    "This puts Microsoft at both a price and platform disadvantage and virtually guarantees we'll soon see server-based office applications on WebTV."

    Microsoft owns WebTV.

    Doesn't he realize this is the exact reason MS bought WebTV in the first place? Right now, they don't even offer Java on that platform... so why on earth would they want to buy WebTV -- a company that could potentially a huge distributor of an alternate platform (Java)? So they can control it!

    It was a fight just to get RealAudio (another MS foe) on WebTV. If MS ever finally decides to let Java onto WebTV, you can bet your sweet bippy that they will have their own java-enabled Office software ready and waiting. Or maybe their version of Java will lack a few things needed to run StarOffice applets...

    The second problem I had with Cringely's article is that he makes the same assumption many Linux zealots make: If the software is free, everyone will use it! His last paragraph was almost a joke.

    Linux is NOT a threat to Microsoft (or any user-friendly OS maker) at the *consumer level* until it is re-designed from the ground up to be USER-FRIENDLY.

    Otherwise, you'll be limited to the sysadmins, networking dudes, geeks, academics, and programmers market. Not that there's anything wrong with that... but I'm sick of hearing about how Linux is going to take over the world. If you believe that, you're not living in the real world. I consider myself OS agnostic... I've used and liked quite a few (Windows, MacOS, Irix, BeOS, etc). This gives me the power to look around without tinting my view with a personal OS bias. I just do not see Linux invading the consumer market until it has a MAJOR overhaul.

    This means, for starters: a uniform GUI across all applications, ease of (secure) maintenance, ease of installation, great USB/plug-n-play support, etc. To me, the UI is Linux's biggest detractor, followed by ease of installation/maintenance.

    -WW

    --
    Why are there so many Unix-using Star Trek fans?
    When was the last time Picard said, "Computer, bring

  • dirty little secret (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Let me be the first to clue you in on a dirty little secret.

    Office isn't 100% compatible with Office, or even 50% compatible, especially not among the various versions, or even among the subreleases of an individual version.

    I deliver database files to mailing houses for CASS certification, always in DbaseIII format because anybody can read them. It's the gold standard among formats. The dolts always send them back in XLS files (which version? who knows), I reject the work, and then they click on the .dbf button (duh), and I get my data.

    This is not a valid criticism of any program, let alone Applix or SO.

  • Indeed this could be the new strategy, although I think it took the increasing visibilty of Linux and OSS for the corporate jocks to clue in.

    Since MS has been known to undermine competition by underpricing and even giving away software, a tactic that is subsidised by the Windows monopoly cash cow, this strategy is basically poetic justice.

    But how do you make money from poetic justice? Professional Services and subscriptions to online services. Open software is a low-to-no cost development item so giving away (not selling) something that costs nothing is not going to cause much of a loss. Selling services, all sorts of services, is where the cash comes in.

    Make them come to your portal by giving the software away. They then know the site is there and may (hopefully will) come back for services and/or other goodies.

    It's a service economy, remember? (I keep hearing this anyway). Services and other value adds is also the standard answer to "How do we make $$$ from OSS?"

    -M


  • I definately don't agree that just because it's not M$Office compliant that it's unusable, in fact i think that's what makes it so great - it's by time we started a new standard for word processing. No more storage of massive binary data, use something editable by an ASCII editer, like LaTeX, sure it takes up more space, but that isn't as much an issue as it once was.

    It's not unusable at all - it's just not as good (not a crime or a putdown) as MS Office yet. My real fear is that Sun will drop the ball on continuing to improve it.

    Ever since I installed it my Win98 box has suddenly become unstable (used to be 2-3 days between reboots, now I'm getting BAD crashes at least once a day. The only thing I've changed is adding Star Office and Agent 1.6. I'm hoping it's a coincidence. Star Office doesn't seem to handle the page formatting stuff as well as MS Office, and the one-master-app thing is a little different.

    I'm having a few beta tester type people test it out, and no complaints yet - they like it but it's an adjustment. When I get back in I'm going to have my department as a whole try it out. I wish the various apps were individually runable without loading the star desktop thing. That is one thing I find truly annoying.

    Is there someplace we can email them with suggestions/requests?
  • One thing I've been wondering about this:

    What _is_ gcc's problem on RISC machines? Is it the code scheduler (or other very machine-dependent parts), or simply the fact that gcc didn't (and probably still doesn't) have nearly the same level of (mostly) machine independent optimizations? Only just recently did egcs get global CSE and alias analysis. These sorts of things make a big difference on load-store machines.

    My bet is that gcc 2.95 does MUCH better on Alpha, but maybe still not as good as the native compiler.

    Does anyone have hard data on this?

    --

  • I like the sig - Bill Gates is obviously a brilliant mathemetician.
    http://www.bombcar.com It's where it is at.
  • Which is more valuable to you, the operating system files or your own data?

    I don't know about you, but I can always re-install the OS from CD ... pity I can't do that for my personal stuff. True, I have a backup, but I'm still going to lose the current day's work.

    In short, the original poster had an excellent point. Best way to solve it? A few thoughts:

    - Don't allow macros in document files - require that the macros be in program code files linked to documents. When the virus-laden document is emailed, the program code won't go with it. If program code is needed, send both files.

    - Don't allow autoexec macros, or have a screen that pops up asking if you want to execute the auto-exec macro. Don't allow the user to switch off this protection.

    I think those two changes would go a long way towards killing off macro viruses.

    D

    ----
  • So naturally the Office Suite that will appear on WebTV will be a Microsoft offering, like maybe a huge CaptiveX monster.

    Think? Indeed.

    -M
  • Thank you for getting me to smile!

    Well, I am glad that someone enjoyed that comment, obviously some moderator didn't, as that post got marked down a point... Ah well.

  • I sounds like you believe that most of the Alpha business came from NT and that the loss of NT means the loss of most Alpha business. Where I work we do hundreds of millions of dollars in Alpha business every year. Less than 10% of that business was NT based, the rest is Tru64 Unix, OpenVMS and Linux. NT has been a marketing and financial boat-anchor for The alpha platform. Many customers believed that the long term migration path was from Unix/VMS to NT and they avoided Alhpa because they didn't want to be caught up in that migration. Compaq was losing money on NT, they make great profits on VMS, Tru64 Unix and Linux.
  • Excuse me. You must have missed the part where I
    named all the different OS's I've used, so I'll do
    it again: Windows, BeOS, MacOS, Irix, and Linux.

    Currently I rank user-friendliness of those
    systems as such:

    1. MacOS
    2. Windows
    3. BeOS (still young, but can beat Windows
    in this category very soon with some changes)
    4. Irix
    5. Linux

    That's just my opinion, but I would challenge
    anyone to show how Linux is any easier to use
    than BeOS, Windows, or MacOS for the *average
    user*.

    "If you put Windows and Linux head-to-head in front of a computer-unaware beginner with the goal of installing exactly the same feature set, Windows would be so far behind that it wouldn't even figure on the user-friendly map."

    Hahaha! I cannot describe how absurd this statement truly is. Sadly, it is very clear
    that you are blinded by your Linux faith.
    Instead, why not open your eyes and try to
    realize where Linux's failings really are?
    It can't hurt.

    First of all, your argument hinges on Windows
    only. My statement was that Linux is well behind
    Windows, MacOS, and BeOS. Apparantly you agree
    that Linux doesn't compare to MacOS or BeOS in
    the user-friendliness category.

    Secondly, you only speak of the installation
    process. I am more concerned about the ease of
    use of the operating system after installation.
    However, installation is a key for seconday OS's
    like BeOS and Linux.

    I am a competent computer user (been using them
    for 12+ years). I have been programming for the
    past 3-4 years, and I am a CS major. In short, the
    first time I installed Windows 3.1, Windows 95,
    Windows NT, etc. I found them annoying, and
    occasionally impossible due to hardware problems.

    However, compared to the 5 different times I tried
    or completed a Linux installation (all in the past
    year or two), I felt like I had gone through HELL.
    Reading HOWTO's out the wazoo for every different
    piece of hardware, securing the system, navigating
    the system, and ::shudder:: configuring the
    windowing systems. None of the entire process was
    the least bit intuitive. Worst of all, most of the
    installs I tried were downright UGLY. Not just in
    what I had to do, but what I had to look at
    on-screen. These things go a long way towards
    user-friendliness.

    Not that I like to defend the likes of Microsoft,
    but they have spent millions on testing the window
    system on people to see what makes things easier
    to use. This has led to advancements in things
    like access for the handicapped and sight-
    impaired. I would rather inflict Chinese water
    torture then turn over a Linux-based computer to a
    handicapped friend or relative!

    Instead of comparing Linux installs to Windows --
    which as you said is not fair because Windows
    comes pre-installed on most computers -- why not
    compare it to BeOS?

    BeOS installation takes roughly 10-15 minutes, and
    is almost completely GUI based. Granted, it will
    likely become a longer process once there is more
    supported hardware and networking/multi-user
    capabilities. However, don't expect it to ever
    sink to the level of a current Linux install.

    It's sort of a paradox that Linux's biggest plus
    is also it's largest minus: it's development is
    driven largely by computer geeks. I mean, the
    reason Linux has come so far is because it has had
    great people working on it. But it has now reached
    a point where it needs the influence of designers
    and GUI gurus if it wants to approach the consumer
    level. I wish Linux the best of luck, but I'm not
    betting on it at the consumer level.

    -WW

    --
    Why are there so many Unix-using Star Trek fans?
    When was the last time Picard said, "Computer, bring
  • Apparantly Microsoft agreed with you, which is
    why you can set it up for single-clicking in
    Win98 and 2000.

    But if you're going to go that route, can't I ask
    you what is *intuitive* about pressing on this weird thing with the little plastic boxes on it?

    Especially those weird ones at the top, with two
    different symbols on each box... what the hell does

    !
    1

    mean anyway?

    -WW

    P.S. I bet more people on earth have seen someone
    double-click than type 'ls' at a command prompt.
    That's what I consider intuitive.

    --
    Why are there so many Unix-using Star Trek fans?
    When was the last time Picard said, "Computer, bring
  • I didn't mean to sound too harsh on the Alpha,
    personally I would kill for one. Im all in favour of competition especially against Intel/Microsoft but I reckon that they have lost out on a potential market increase by losing NT.
    Just my $0.02 worth.
  • Since we're the IT department, we inflict everything except the engineering apps on us for beta testing prior to rolling ANYTHING out to an end-user.

    I'd worry more about companies that don't do a little inhouse testing before rolling something out.

    As a result our user's office workstations are VERY stable
  • It's not a matter of more important vs less important. We have a large number of employees who have access to workstations but have no real need for office applications.

    This would let us better spend our money. Remember, IT is overhead in a typical company, not a profit center.
  • I was rather amazed by the (unattributed) comment that Cringely made in his column:

    Compaq engineers quietly admit that Linux on Alpha runs better than Compaq's own Unix.

    Since Linux is built with GCC, and Tru64 Unix with GEM C, I cannot figure out which engineers that Cringely has been talking with. GEM has been rather carefully optimized and tuned for the Alpha architecture, and I know the same is true of Tru64's libc and pthreads implementation.

    Don't get me wrong, Linux works fine on Alphas, and their performance will only get better as Linux (and GCC) are made more 64-bit aware. And Compaq has a whole bunch of people trying to help get applications ported to both Tru64 and Linux.
    --
  • Since StarOffice has a programming script, I don't see why it also won't be vulnerable to macro viruses.

    Its not just having a scripting language in the product that causes the problem. It is allowing the scripts to automatically run on opening the document for one. It is also how much outside the "sandbox" of the application the scripting language is allowed to do. Scripting languages in applications are nothing new (for example JavaScript in browsers), however VBA in Microsoft Office basically has total access to the entire Windows machine, which is a problem in a highly networked world.

    Even in a Linux environment such a virus could cause a lot of damage.

    Perhaps, but only likely if someone runs their office suite as root, or some other similar user-related security hole. In general, it is users that are the biggest weakness in security.

  • >. . . look for Gates to
    >reinvent Microsoft as an on-line media company.

    And that will be the end of Microsoft.

    Think MS is having fits over Open Source software like Linux, *BSD, Apache & Samba? Publishing is a high-risk, high-cost business. Take the book industry: the traditional rule of thumb is that of ten books published every year, 7 loose money, 2 break even, & the tenth one pays for the other nine.

    Television is about the same -- only where the cost of publishing the average book is in the tens of thousands, the average tv show is in the hundreds of thousands, if not the millions.

    And movie-making is even more risky: does anyone else out there remember how the movie _Heaven's Gate_ drove a major studio into bankrupcy?

    Of course, if the folks in Redmond were truly imaginative, innovative people, who relied on their skills & not on their hands around the throat of the computer industry, they might be able to pull this off. ;-)


    Geoff
  • I agree with the top of this thread--SO as a web-based Java application is a _bad_ idea. But I disagree about the impact of the non-Java SO.

    The crucial difference is that IE and Netscape are both free. Office 2K is expensive. A free (as in free beer) SO has got to be worrisome to Microsoft. Large corporations who are dollar-conscious may want to use SO and not pay hundreds per workstation to license Office2K. Consumers might also use SO rather than Office2K for simple tasks.

    Look at the WordPerfect suite. Granted, it doesn't rule the world. But companies like Gateway are bundling it with their lowest-priced computers simply because Office2K raises the price point of the low end too much.
  • I've seen a number of messages suggesting that Sun is shooting itself in the foot with SCSL, since the 'bazaar' model really needs "Open Source" to work.

    All these posters seems to be misinterpreting what Sun hopes to gain through this. They aren't hoping that some huge assortment of hackers are going to leap in and do massive amounts of development. They fully expect to continue doing the vast majority of new development in StarOffice, Java, Jini, ClusterTools, etc. Since they aren't really trying for bazaar-style development, they don't need a bazaar-facilitating license.

    Once you understand that Sun isn't trying to offload their development work on the hacker community, SCSL seems like a pretty good compromise between Sun's interests and the end users'.

    Good things in SCSL for end users:

    • The source is available.
    • You can fix bugs that are more important to you than to Sun. Sure, they would probably fix your pet bug someday, but they might have better-paying customers who want other bugs fixed first.
    • You can add features that Sun isn't interested in, or isn't interested enough in.
    • You can port the software to non-Sun hardware.
    Good things in SCSL for Sun (since no company does this stuff out of the goodness in their hearts):
    • They get bug fixes done more quickly than if they had to do all the work themselves.
    • They get software ported to other machines that they may not have the resources to support. This seems like an odd benefit for a hardware company, but Java and Jini become stronger the more widely ported they are. The benefit to seeing ClusterTools and StarOffice ported isn't as clear.
    • They get good press.
    • They can stick it to Microsoft. Since Sun makes its money on hardware, they have less to lose than Microsoft, which has nothing to sell but the secrets in their source.
    • Since SCSL is more restricted than GPL, BSD, etc, they can prevent Microsoft from co-opting the source, adding a whizzy new MS-specific feature, and becoming the de facto 'standard'.
    • Oh yeah - maybe somebody will implement a new feature or two.
  • Its not MS that has bought those works, but Gates himself.

    I don't recall who owns Corbis, MS or Bill, but it is the largest image stock compnay in the world having relatively recently bought out one of its biggest competitors.

    And besides, MS can only rewrite history for those that read their revisions!

  • The rationale behind web based applications is so that users need not shell out $$$ for a full blown PC, only a cheaper "WebTV-like" gizmo. With PCs becoming so cheap, why should anyone put up with the hassle of working with a distributed application, especially for word processing and spreadsheets.

    Even if PCs don't get much cheaper, most people will be willing to spend the extra $200-400 to get a real PC and avoid the hassle of running their office suite over an internet connection. Word process over a 56K modem line (or even a DSL/cable modem)? I don't think so.
  • Did anybody notice this article [news.com] over at news.com. Steve Ballmer was quoted as saying "We certainly will have Web-based office productivity services, no doubt about it." It's funny how every time one of their competitors makes a surprise announcement like Sun did Microsoft jumps up with the attitude of "oh, of course we had plans for this all along too, so you'll naturally want to wait for are version because everybody always ends up using our products anyway so don't risk your future compatability by using a product which actually exists now". I predict one of two things will happen here:

    1. This will end up becoming classic Microsoft vaporware.
    2. They will shove pieces of Office into ActiveX controls in Microsoft's usual, contorted manner and claim that it is a web based office system despite the fact that it's bloated to the point of being useless for internet use and that it only runs on Windows.
  • Please don't add "most likely" comments.

    Actually, that was "more likely".

    You've contributed nothing when you do so.

    Forgive me for not taking criticism on posting from an AC very seriously. Who are you to say what I can and can't post? Who are you to speak for everyone else on what is a valid contribution and what isn't?

    I can comment on things I know little about too. I choose not to.

    Personally, I think you just did. How do you know what I know little or a lot about?

    If you don't like what I have to say or how I say it, then get moderator points and moderate me down. Oh, too bad, then I could just get a new account or post as an AC.

  • Since the source is going to be distributed, a nice change would be to re-work the build process so that features could be included or excluded at compile-time. Or possibly even use a module-based system for adding and removing features after compilation...

    Most users don't use anywhere near all of the features of an office suite. Some users need (or want) it all, at least for some of the suite applications. "Bloat" can be reduced by letting people customize their application to their needs.

    In a lot of ways, this favors a Java-based intranet approach, as features used will only be loaded as needed. (A mixed method might have the basic features in a client executable and only load specialty modules from the network.) Of course, this approach requires a network with high throughput and low latency.

  • Can anyone enumerate any benefits that True64 could bring to Linux?

    Well, I don't know much about True64, but they do have something called TrueCluster. I don't know how this compares to Beowulf, but it could be interesting to see if they could do something with that..
  • Microsoft's semi-proprietary almost-XML, more likely.

    Well, XML may be an open standard, but who knows, what I'd like to put into the DTD for my Format?

    But yes, you're right, XML is an even worser buzzword than linux at the moment.

    Ralph

  • " Since StarOffice has a programming script, I don't see why it also won't be vulnerable to macro viruses "

    Seeing as the source code is going to be available. You can always disable them completly. Not that this would be an easy task.

    IIRC, Microsoft refused to release a seperate version with macros disabled completely. The easier Sun makes it to get rid of macros, completely, the better; for Sun.

    Hmmm I really should have a look at the SCSL.

  • People would,'t know that. Right now, when one buys computer he/she does just that. Hardly anybody even realizes that there is something called OS.
  • Well, XML may be an open standard, but who knows, what I'd like to put into the DTD for my Format?

    You've raised a valid point. XML does provide a lot of room for proprietarization of DTD. The real question there is will Microsoft be open about how they implement that? I am not really very optimistic there.

    However, HTML is supposed to be an open standard, and it certainly hasn't stopped Microsoft from implementing proprietary tags in their implementation (to be fair, Netscape has also done so). I think it is entirely likely that we will see Microsoft try to do some significant 'embrace and extend' with both HTML and XML.

  • Excellent example. HP started off making electronic test equipment. They've recently spun that division off into a separate company, so you could say that HP is no longer even in their core business!

  • By opening the source, they are going to minimize the amount work they have to do (just management of releases). Therefore, this is another proof-of-concept. Use open-source to work in another area of the field, where doing it closed sourced would be to big a drain on resources.


    -- Keith Moore

  • Microsoft will be reborn... (Score:3)

    by SpinyNorman ( 33776 ) on Friday September 03, 1999 @01:12AM (#1707660)
    Over the next couple of years Microsoft's earnings growth and margins are sure to decline for the reasons Cringley outlined, but look for Gates to reinvent Microsoft as an on-line media company.

    Even if Microsoft loses the Internet server and home user markets (although they'll eventually drop personal use Windows license prices - to zero if necessary), they'll have the business and office application markets for a long time as a cash cow. They also have a *huge* warchest.

    If you look at all of Microsoft's cable aquisitions (some 20-30 investments - incl. the recent $600M or so in Rogers), the battle they appear to be starting to get in with AOL, and Gate's long standing desire to get into the "razorblade" business, you can see pretty clearly where they are headed...

  • when I last used it it didnt use a separate GUI lib, ie, it had its own. That'd be hard to change to GTK/QT
  • Cringely made at least one good point even tho' it has been made before (ESR comes to mind). That is that M$ is afraid of open standards.

    So, instead of getting on the StarOffice/Applixware/AbiSource/whatever soapbox, the Linux/Open Source community should be screaming and shouting about open standards. TCP/IP and HTML have proven what benefit there is to open standards. So, why not open standards for all software?

    Word processors have been around for a long time, so why isn't there a WP standard? You basically need formatting (indentation, justification, margins, etc.), fonts, chaptering, indexing, etc. If that were standardized, then all WPs could import and export docs that all others could read.

    The same can be said about spreadsheets and presentation packages. DBs already have SQL which is somewhat standardized. And there are probably applications that I never use that could be included.

    Let's climb on the standards bandwagon, and ask the other OS backers to join us. If all the BSDers, BEOSers, UN*Xers, Hurders, OS/2ers, and any otherers could define standards and write all Open Source software to them, then a lot of the commercial companies that have come to Linux in hopes of saving themselves from the M$ juggernaut would pretty much have to play along. And thanks to the success of the Internet, open standards carries a lot of weight with business AND end users.
  • Would just like to make a comment on the Staroffice Web application.. it's a move in the right direction. Thin clients/fat server model is the ideal one for most home applications. The whole idea of spending $2000 or even $1000, to get a piece of equipment that is going to be used for a little bit of publishing and small-time number crunching, and which is going to be obsolete in a matter of years.. is ludicrous. Computers arent worth that much to many people. The javastation idea would have been really great if it was implemented correctly. A native java chip running remote apps? Expensive servers.. but far cheaper client machines? This sounds like the PERFECT model for a lot of businesses deploying computers to employees. It takes care of a lot of issues like consistency (everyone would run the same versions of apps, and everyone could have their customized preferences stored on the server), upgrading (upgrade 1ce), the path to obsolecence (the clients will not grow obsolete as fast. Perhaps the server.. but then, 1 server purchase v. 20/30/100/1000 client purchases is still a good deal). -Laxative

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