OSDev.org

I agree, and for the most part, a firewall built into a router is 'good enough' for 99% of home users, no need for crappy windows firewalls ever, yet another paranoia product imho.

Not to start a religious war, but I have considered osx. I was put off by the excessive price of the hardware and the fact that a lot of the software I liked didnt exist on mac. There are osx alternatives but I just plain didn't like them out of personal opinion and taste.

Back then I mainly used windows and luckily I don't really use windows for much these days so if I was to weigh up the pros and cons again, it would now only be the price that puts me off.

Hi,

brain wrote:I take it you haven't used antivirus on your home pcs for years either? When in windows I run as an unprivilaged user and never use ie, and I rarely install software. I have never had a virus infection in almost 20 years of computing.

I don't use anti-virus, but I also don't put anything important on my Windows machine (it's mostly just a machine I use for games, web browsing and videos). In all my time owning "PC compatible" computers (a mixture of different versions of Windows and Linux, spanning over 20 years) I've never actually had a virus. However, I have been burnt by faulty RAM twice. Basically, I won't trust that Windows machine for anything important because it doesn't have ECC RAM.

berkus wrote:I guess Brendan would never consider using OSX, as it just fixes all the kinds of problems he described. That would be too easy.

Brendan would consider using OSX - there's some things (like AppleScript) that I do want to mess around with. Unfortunately, for hardware I prefer "off the shelf" replacement/upgrade parts (and don't even have a laptop because of this), and for OS development I prefer Linux. For games I just use whatever I have spare (an old 32-bit version of Windows on a much newer 64-bit computer that came without any OS). I don't really have a good enough reason to buy OSX.

For me, except for curiosity, the biggest reason to buy an Apple machine is to test my OS on their "not quite compliant" UEFI firmware. I even bought an Apple machine once (a Mac Mini) for testing/developing UEFI boot loaders; but the seller didn't send it after they'd received my cash (thankfully eBay/Paypal returned my money).


Cheers,

Brendan

Brendan wrote:Hi,

brain wrote:I take it you haven't used antivirus on your home pcs for years either? When in windows I run as an unprivilaged user and never use ie, and I rarely install software. I have never had a virus infection in almost 20 years of computing.

I don't use anti-virus, but I also don't put anything important on my Windows machine (it's mostly just a machine I use for games, web browsing and videos). In all my time owning "PC compatible" computers (a mixture of different versions of Windows and Linux, spanning over 20 years) I've never actually had a virus. However, I have been burnt by faulty RAM twice. Basically, I won't trust that Windows machine for anything important because it doesn't have ECC RAM.

berkus wrote:I guess Brendan would never consider using OSX, as it just fixes all the kinds of problems he described. That would be too easy.

Brendan would consider using OSX - there's some things (like AppleScript) that I do want to mess around with. Unfortunately, for hardware I prefer "off the shelf" replacement/upgrade parts (and don't even have a laptop because of this), and for OS development I prefer Linux. For games I just use whatever I have spare (an old 32-bit version of Windows on a much newer 64-bit computer that came without any OS). I don't really have a good enough reason to buy OSX.

For me, except for curiosity, the biggest reason to buy an Apple machine is to test my OS on their "not quite compliant" UEFI firmware. I even bought an Apple machine once (a Mac Mini) for testing/developing UEFI boot loaders; but the seller didn't send it after they'd received my cash (thankfully eBay/Paypal returned my money).


Cheers,

Brendan

ECC RAM can still fail, and I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if it's failure rates were not much better than non ECC RAM. If you were to Memtest your memory and confirm it had 0 errors, than the odds of it failing anytime in the foreseeable future are negligible. The odds of any failure resulting in any data loss is even lower, and that data loss being more than 15 minutes of unsaved progress on some piece of code\email\game are basically 0 if you save stuff frequently (which you always should). Most good programs have autosave features anyways. Not doing anything important because a computer doesn't have ECC RAM is a level of paranoia I'd yet to encounter.

Also, PC laptops use as much off the shelf parts as they can. I believe the majority of new laptops come with socketed CPU's, in addition to standard DDR2\3 memory, standard 2.5in SATA HDD's and more or less standard DVD drives. Quite possible you'll suffer from bezel\contour problems depending on the design though. This covers all the most common upgrade paths besides the GPU, which is semi upgradeable in a handful of higher end laptops as well. Everything is covered by the manufactures warranty, so if your paranoid about it breaking after that's up, I'm positive you won't struggle to find someone selling an extending warranty .


OSX is probably the best OS when it comes to just web browsing\chatting\watching videos\etc without hassles. Problem is that the hardware you need to use OSX is horribly expensive, which isn't exactly ideal when it comes to doing simple things like web browsing\etc. You'll also run in to all kinds of problems finding software for specific things. Worst of all, you're stuck with the absolute insanity that is Apple.

With the proper distro, Linux is almost as good as OSX in the above aspect, but for average users, any problems they have can be severely exacerbated by the fact that there are dozens of different Linux distro's that have even more ways of doing things. Even if you're savvy enough to be able to Google stuff and attempt to find a solution, you can struggle to find something that works with your specific version of your specific distro. For an average user, where their idea of problem solving is to just ask their computer savvy friend\brother\son\etc to do it, this is a show stopper. Other aspects like software\hardware support are mountains better than OSX, but still don't approach that of Windows.

Windows falls in the middle of OSX\Linux when it comes to the level of difficulty to troubleshoot problem with it. Average users get a rather sufficient amount of hand holding when trying to fix common problems. This is helped signifigantly by the fact that there is really only two major versions of modern Windows' systems (Windows XP and Windows Vista\7), and that there is so much available "for absolute dummies" type of help. Almost the entire OS is GUI driven, which absolutely huge when it comes to the average user. If you have to Google a problem you're having with Linux, you should just open up a terminal before you even open up your web browser. Windows is also the only OS that supports DirectX, and is the solely supported OS for the vast majority of computer games. The biggest problem with Windows also one of it's greatest strengths, that is it's wide usage. Software companies continue to churn out horrible software and device drivers for Windows that haunt so many users without their knowledge. Windows 8 will help solve some stability problems with Metro style apps, but the idea of "apps" is not appealing to people like me. This is also a step towards doing things the "Apple way", which personally I absolutely despise.


All that being said, I use Windows 7 and wouldn't consider using anything else besides Windows 8. The easiest reason to explain is the fact that I've spent a lot of money maintaining a gaming PC, so leaving Windows behind outright isn't really possible. I also have no problems with Windows, I know it very well, love it, and don't see any merits to voluntarily switching to Linux or BSD, and I can't afford to switch to OSX. That being said, if I were forced to chose between Linux, or buying a copy of Windows 7 for use on my laptop (where I just do the simple stuff), I don't even think I would consider forking over any money for Windows. I'm just too cheap to spend the money on a retail version of Windows if I don't have to.

Personally I don't like the heavy use of page swapping and general hd activity in Windows. Some of this is due to antivirus activity, but in general if you have anything but a clean install it tends to really grind on startup. I also get the impression that it's indexing is pretty ineffecient as there definitely seems to be some correlation by how slowly it loads and how much you have on your desktop or in your user folders (no numbers, just a theory). I also severly dislike the new UI in Windows 8 on aesthetic grounds. I'll add that Windows Me is to date the worst OS I've ever owned by a large margin (after the video driver issues were fixed even Vista was way better).

For Linux I generally dislike how fragemented and non standardized the software base is. It's kind of that orphan child syndrome, don't get attached to anything for too long because it probably won't be around forever. There's obviously a lot of differences from distro to distro as well and the necessity to build certain things from source if you need them, which probably isn't a big deal for people will a fair amount of programming experience but isn't something that is appropriate for the average computer user. Distro will also make some oddball decisions as to what packages they'll incorporate in the base install or sometimes even allow as a matter of subjective philosphy. Some examples being Arch Linux's insistance that multilib gcc builds wouldn't be availble on the x86_64 version and ubuntu's desire to shove an immature and difficult to remove noveau driver into the distro long before it was mature. The kernel itself is nice and stable, but the ecosystem surrounding it has too much churn for my tastes.

In general I'm also getting tired of the idea that slapping a search bar on everything is new the future of the UI. I know where my files are and the programs I generally want to run, I don't need some mini google slapped on top of everything to obsfucate the entire process. If it's there as a feature great, but don't make the only way to get around the desktop.

The think i hate most is that there is nearly no OS that i could control entirely with GamePad.

I don't hate anything about Windows 7, but there are a couple things I would change. It seems like its networking system defaults to using IPv6 instead of IPv4 -- for some old games written in the pre-IPv6 era, this can cause servers on localhost to not be recognized by a client on localhost. Could also be a DirectPlay fault, but that's tied close to Windows' networking facilities.

MasterLee wrote:The think i hate most is that there is nearly no OS that i could control entirely with GamePad.

Perhaps you'll see this in Windows 8, with its similarities to the Xbox Dashboard.

I decided that I'l, add android on (even though the thread says PC):
Android's UI is a mess and it is SLOW. They should AOT the dalvik bytecode when installing instead of JIT it everytime. It would save both power and time.
and iOS:
iOS is too dumbed-down. Its great otherwise, fast and responsive too unlike droid

android vs ios, I agree that android is a f***ing mess. menus and settings are not even on the same place depending on phone model, and there seems to be no logic to where some settings are stored, since all programs/screens show different things with a press on the settings button. iOS is so much better in all regards to user experience and UI, and whats not there to begin with is easily added with apps/jailbreak hacks.
open source isn't everything, but i guess android is good for the stallman-like fanatics out there. also, if android hadn't been released, i actually think many other manufactures would have gone bankrupt within a couple of years - just look at the dive nokia has taken since the 3310 days, and continues to take with the new win8 models (facepalm)...

Rudster816 wrote:If you have to Google a problem you're having with Linux, you should just open up a terminal before you even open up your web browser.

This is as much a problem with the culture of Linux users as it is with the DE's provided by Linux distributions. When a new user asks "How do I do XYZ", a guru will more often than not respond with command-line oriented advice, even if the distribution in question provides a way to accomplish that task via the GUI.

Now, part of this is due to the fragmentation of the Linux DE "market", such that the guru may not know what DE the new user is actually using, in which case giving command-line oriented advice has its advantages.

I have Windows 7 x64, and an XP on a laptop, and I have no problems with them(of significance).
Some problems include:
on the XP: Extreme slowness(the XP has 1 gig and is more dust than not(made in 2002) )
on the 7: Compatibility issues(it is x64 )
on the XP: bluescreens everytime I plug a USB device in(reminds me of the Windows 98 public BSOD )

and I have one program(hl2.exe, the Valve source engine) that crashes frequently and one time BSODed my computer.
I also hate the fact that you can BSOD the system deliberatly with a function call(KeBugCheckEx())

PS: I also have 8 and 1.01 on a virtual machine with no problems

Brendan, I liked your first long post a lot, couldn't agree more, you've even made me to register and add my own impressions on this subject.

1. Linux - I agree with Brendan that Linus and/or his team should contribute more than just the kernel, developing some standards for the rest of the system. Open OSes are meant to be highly customizable systems, but generally speaking they are not. You can write a patch for kernel or any other program, but when the next update of this software comes from its developers you can well discover that your patch is no longer valid, so you need to re-write it after each update or just abandon, as you can't afford forking the whole thing, can you. Back compatibility is an issue for Linux, with myriads of kernel, GCC, glibc etc. versions put out and being in circulation. I've experienced quite a few times that when I wanted to install some little simply utility written 3-4 years ago it would not compile, just because f.ex. a header file from a standard library had been moved from one folder to another.

I don't think it's a good idea to carry on with GUIs based on X. It made sense in the 80's when terminals existed separately from workstations, but those times are long gone. I'd like to see more move towards GUIs working directly with framebuffer. The DirectFB team are doing something of that kind in their internal world, but most of the time I fail to compile all of their stuff and their documentation, if any, is extremely poor.

2. NetBSD - an unexpected one here, isn't it? Everyone is praising it as a very robust and 'an orthodox Unix' system, probably because noone (well, almost) is actually using it. May be it's robust for usage on a server on some outdated or obscure hardware, and yes, the NetBSD team have come up with some really interesting solutions through the years, and its kernel code is a pleasure to browse (much better organised than in Linux), but as a desktop system it's IMHO disastrous. The system is indeed very good, but it must be suffering from its community being too small. I started using it in 2003/2004 when I decided to try one of the BSD systems and NetBSD was the only one of them where I could easily set up pptp/VPN connection with my ISP, so I just stuck to it since, from 1.6.1 till 5.1. But working on it as a desktop system in the way I've been used to doing on Linux was a pain in arse, too buggy and not so much help from online communities. I gave up about 2 years ago, when I tried to install Gnome via the net from an official repository and it failed because of broken dependencies. It might just be too late for NetBSD to make hopes of going desktop and competing here with Linux, so they should concentrate on other niches. I'll be very happy if I'll be proven wrong though, as this system has its magic and has really won my heart.

3. Windows 7 - I think Windows XP has had the best Windows interface ever and I don't like how Microsoft has changed it in Vista and 7. The new control panel is way too entangled, hate it. It's 5 years since MS Office 2007 came out and I still can't get used to its new interface missing the good old one. The same mistake has been done with Windows - don't fix it if it ain't broken!

4. Android - come on guys, has Google ever put a finished product out on the market?

what i don't understand is why nobody in the *nix world has tried to copy osx? thats how the end users/idiots/common people (call 'em what you want) wants a desktop os to work. it obviously proves that it's possible to make a decent desktop on top of some linux/bsd like kernel, and you don't have to use command line & config files for everything, yet it's possible to go behind the scenes if wanted.

if i ever where to write an OS in C with desktop usage as goal, i'd take a hard long look at the most promising existing *nix kernels and build a good desktop solution on top of it, most likely heavily based on how OSX does things.

but i'm not, so.. 100% assembly works fine for my own use/hobby/crazy @$$.

> why nobody in the *nix world has tried to copy osx
a lot of people/companies try.
But it's more about design, marketing and patents, than about osdev. Crowd of programmers can't just replace this crowd of designers and people who are thinking _how_ to sell and to patent as much as possible.

We have at least two systems that try to borrow as much as possible from macos - they're windows (Vista, 7 and further) and *ubuntu. The result is IMHO eye-bleading and hand-breaking.

Nable wrote:> why nobody in the *nix world has tried to copy osx
a lot of people/companies try.
But it's more about design, marketing and patents, than about osdev. Crowd of programmers can't just replace this crowd of designers and people who are thinking _how_ to sell and to patent as much as possible.

No, it's more about having one developing team/company for everything an OS consists of, kernel, drivers, GUI, userland libraries, compilers, etc. When it's produced by different groups having different policies, unification can't be reached by definition. But such an unification is IMHO not impossible within the free community, as an approximation consider Cygwin, ReactOS etc. Just wait until RedHat or Shuttleworth hire Thorvalds and Stallman...