The Tech Journal

Just Say No to Microsoft November 28, 2005

Got the book, read the book. It was a fairly interesting read from someone who clearly is biased. It doesnt paint a pretty picture of Microsoft and I very much disagree with many of his assertations on competeing products such as saying iTunes doesnt contain any DRM schemes, they all do. Or his assertation that Linux is a hacker proof system. He provides a good overlook of the OpenOffice.org office suite and the history contained withing has much of the Urban Legends as well as some of the actual facts. Will this book make many people switch? Yep the ignorant and uninformed will switch, for those more intuned to the computer industry, many will see it as the work of fiction mixed in with free advertising for Open Source solutions, then I doubt it will have much effect. One of the reviewers on Amazons site states the author tried to avoid bashing Microsoft, it was quite apparent he tried very much to bash Microsoft

More Mass. drama and of course Microsoft accused November 27, 2005

Seems the guy didnt approve his travels and he may have breached a state conflict-of-interest law. Of course the OSS zealots are accusing Microsoft of doing dirty but its often a requirement for travel and itinerary to have WRITTEN authorization and to provide an expense report. If he neglected those requirements than he is at fault.

FSFE seeks to intervene November 25, 2005

Free Software Foundation of Europe seeks to intervene in the Microsoft/EU appeal case. They claim Microsofts networking specifications need to be more open so that they can be used in Open Source projects. In laymes terms they want the whole package or nothing at all. While FSFE maintains that they want it for mere competitive reasons they are not seemingly paying any attention to Microsofts rights as an IP holder. Now if they can prove Microsoft violated the licensing of the LDAP, Kerberos and SMB source licenses, I would say they had a case. Microsoft works with many vendoers to provide interoperability and for that matter many Linux distributions use software with a royalty free license and not an Open Source license such as Java, VMWARE Workstation and Oracle DB. Microsoft should not be forced to put its own intellectual property rights at risk.

Low prices, Windows capture server market November 23, 2005

Break out the motherfucking champagne, Microsoft leads in the server market. Good job guys.

Microsoft’s standardization move divides experts November 23, 2005

More debates from the experts. Its good to se this conversation about standards but one expert has it all wrong. The OpenDocument Format is not a standard. Its a specification. At least this is how OASIS describes it on their site. OpenXML is not a standard either…Yet. Its also noteworthy to point out that OpenDocument has not been approved as a standard by ECMA or the ISO. My advice to everyone is to wait to see how this plays out in ECMA and in the ISO. I for one am planning to “wait and see”

Mac OS X could kill Microsoft November 22, 2005

I read this on OSNews and I thought it would lead to a Mac site and I like a good Mac story. Coming from the NeXTStep and early Rhapsody adopters thats what I thought I would be reading about. The rise of Mac OS X. LXer printed this article and my only question is: Do editors bother to read the articles put up? I’m going to post my thoughts on this article. If you like em fine, if not. Well, tough shit its my opinion.

WARNING: This blog entry contains profanity, if you offend easily dont read it. Also Im not an english scholar or major, it may contain grammatical and spelling errors, if this gets under your skin revise it, correct it and I will change it otherwise any e-mails or comments telling me Im mean, rude, or that it contains grammatical errors or that Im a poo poo head will be deleted and ignored.

Now lets get on with it:

” No one would call Steve Jobs a man of the people right now. But they could. Steve has the capacity to become a global hero. He just hasn’t availed himself of the opportunity. ”

I should have realized this was going to lead to trouble so I kept going.

” Steve has the capacity to be loved even with his current detractors. People would forgive and forget with Steve if he made a couple of moves toward a different model of business. That’s not the case with Bill Gates.”

What is there to forgive in regards to Steve Jobs? I have dealt with the Mac community and Apple since 1997. Clear it up.

” Bill Gates could open source all his products, put Office into a public project and port it to Linux, adopt the GPL and people will continue to regard him with contempt. He may give all his money away before he dies and the world won’t even mention him as a footnote in history. The Gates legacy lives in infamy. We know him for what he represents”

This is where the ignorance of the author really started to piss me off. Mind you not because he is a Linux guy, I dont mind a Linux guy. But because he is a fricking moron. Bill Gates has done more for the third world, finding cures for diseases and trying to help with the worlds problems than anyone gives him credit for. The Gates foundation donates millions of dollars in medical aid, technology and funds and this guy thinks Bill Gates will be remembered for the technology industry and what a small group of people think of him. Uhmm Asshole, ask anyone who doesnt pay any attention to the tech industry who Bill Gates is and you wont hear, monopolist, produces closed source software. You will hear Rich, nerd, geek and someone may mention the Gates foundation. Who are your heroes? Larry Ellison, the CEO of Oracle who runs around like a 19 year old with a permanent hard on? Or maybe Larry and Sergei (sorry if I misspelled the name). Bill Gates is donating his money and time to trying to help find a cure for AIDs, they are buying used 767’s just for the hell of it. Yet they are better men than Bill Gates? Give me a break. I’m not judging anyone mind you, its their money, they earned it fair and square and they can do what they want with it but at least Bill Gates is giving something back and trying to do good for the world.

As for Steve Jobs. I like Steve Jobs, I think he is a hell of a salesman but in turn I think you are giving the man too much credit. Where has he said he wants to be a global hero? Find me anyone who really wants to be a global hero. Apple can not and should not Open Source Aqua, they already build an Open Source OS its called Darwin. Apple is the only company that has shown me that they can balance proprietary and open source and still turn a huge profit. They balance it out. Open Source is not the cure all, be all of the IT industry a case well learned through SGI. Steve Jobs may be the CEO of Apple but he has to keep the stockholders happy. He has to show the stockholders that he and Apple are capable of success and maintaining value. If he open sources his crown jewels for anyone to port to Linux or even Windows, what value does Apple have then?

You want an Aqua version of OpenOffice, well the community is working on it. If you want OpenOffice without an X Server, try NeoOffice J. Apple makes a word processor, its called Pages and its pretty darn good, they make a presentation package called Keynote, and rumor has it that they are developing a spreadsheet app called Numbers which will undoubtedly have Apples classic signature of beauty and finesse to it. Microsoft makes Office for the Mac, and when it releases its OpenXML import/export filters for Office for Mac you will have your format that will be readable 100 years from now. When the OpenOffice team releases its native version for Mac OS X, you will then have your Open Document Format if thats what you wish to have. I’m pretty sure Apple will make a decision for an XML document format for Pages, Keynote and its upcoming Numbers whether it will be ODF or OpenXML remains to be seen.

Apple is poised that it could give Microsoft a run for its money right now, on its own merits it doesn’t need to open source everything under the sun to do so and it doesnt need to adopt Open Source software to do so because compared next to the offerings Apple has and the capabilities of Apples design teams the open source projects the author mentions do not even stand a chance..

Microsoft to standardize Office formats November 22, 2005

Good news on the Microsoft front. Microsoft will be submitting their OpenXML formats to ECMA for standardization and to the ISO depending on ECMA’s stand. This is a good thing and kudos to Microsoft. This should resolve any fears that anyone considering OpenDocument has for OpenXML. I know I will probably wait for the news on the results before I upgrade either to OpenOffice or Office12. This will rid us of proprietary formats and will open up this space to whomever produces the better software.

Parents sue Blizzard Entertainment November 20, 2005

Surprising what people can sue for nowadays. Parents are suing Blizzard saying their pride and joy died for reenacting a scene from the game. Im not making light of this mind you, but I dont blame the game makers, I blame the parents. Did they sit down and talk to their kid about reality and fantasy? Did they bother to check to see if the game has a mature rating? Where the hell were they when he decided to reenact the scene?

Sun Studio 11 now Free as in beer November 16, 2005

Sun has now made Sun Studio 11 available for free, Free as in Beer, I guess they are hoping to steal a little bit of developer share from
Microsoft and Eclipse.  Its available for Solaris and Linux, no Windows version but seeing as we have VS 2005 it seems this is a retalitory
move to VS 2005.  Will Microsoft ever release a Free as in beer version of VS 2005 to slow these guys down?

Link

U.S retains control over the net November 16, 2005

Good news, looks like the web wont die after all