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Technology Stocks : Microsoft Corp. - Moderated (MSFT) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: miraje who wrote (193)	8/21/2002 9:47:13 AM
From: dybdahl	Respond to of 19790

You still have to compare with TCP/IP. There is a lot of TCP/IP business going on - the protocol itself is free though, and a lot of apps running on top of it are free, too. Linux in the sense of Open Source software and TCP/IP are not two different things - one would not survive without the other. Fragmentation is already there: There are several vendors of SMTP software (like Microsoft, IBM etc.), and there are several implementations of SSH, SSL etc. There is one thing that makes sure that it doesn't fragment like Unix did, however: Since nobody pays for the software itself, everything that is not compatible with mainstream either dies over time or becomes mainstream. For instance, postfix is replacing sendmail as we speak, and cups replaces LPR and LPRng. These changes don't affect the average user though - it's still free, it's still packaged with the distributions, and actually the average user doesn't care. And if you still want to use sendmail or LPRng, just do so. It's still around. The basic different between Linux and Windows is that Windows focuses on software and APIs (which are patentable), whereas Linux focuses on protocols and file formats in order to make sure that anything can be read by anybody without depending on a specific piece of software (like .mdb files depend on the Microsoft Jet engine). Most hardcore Linux people already work for big companies. Some of them had to stop their contributions when they started working for Microsoft or when their company was bought by Microsoft, but IBM/Sun/HP/Dell employees, Telco employees etc., industry employees are all able to work on Open Source projects, sometimes even paid for doing so. Linus himself has been working for Transmeta for quite some time. And these guys don't need to be ready for a show like LinuxWorld. Why should they? How many Windows coders are representing Microsoft at exhibitions? I doubt there are any, unless it's a pizza or Coca Cola exhibition... ZDNet is often crap, especially their commentators. Dybdahl.