[Gllug] He who controls the bootloader

[Richard Cohen]

On Tue, 28 Aug 2001, David Damerell wrote:

> On Tuesday, 28 Aug 2001, Formi wrote:
> > I suppose that most of you have read this.
> > For the few who haven't.
> > This is a REALLY interesting article in Linux Today.
>
> So interesting that the URL must remain secret?
>
> http://www.byte.com/documents/s=1115/byt20010824s0001/0827_hacker.html

'Tis interesting.  Doesn't (directly) affect me, of course, nor, I suspect,
most of the people on this list.

> [It's not in Linux Today, either.]
>
> > After reading it, I have something to say, IBM, Sun and all those
> > huge companies that say they support linux completely....
>
> Sun say they support Linux completely? News to me.

(not on behalf of my employer)
I think I can state quite authoritatively(*) that Sun do no support Linux
completely.  Some parts of the company like Cobalt (duh!), Java or
StarOffice do support Linux completely, but the company as a whole does not.
I would say that the same is very much true of IBM - can anyone tell me
where I can get (buy or otherwise) a copy of Notes Client or SmartSuite
which works and is supported on Linux?

> A potted summary of the article is that it asserts that you cannot buy
> dual-boot Windows/Linux boxes from the big PC vendors because
> Microsoft impose restrictive conditions on them to prevent bundling
> any other OS; this also prevented the release of dual boot
> BeOS/Windoze bozes.
>
> It's a nice conspiracy theory, but suffers (like most conspiracy
> theories) from a total lack of positive evidence; the lack of
> dual-boot systems is interesting, but I can think of an explanation
> straight off; the large PC vendors shipping Linux systems see them as
> aimed at the server space, where you're highly unlikely to want to
> dual boot so you can play Serious Sam on your Web server. The place
> where dual boot machines really appeal is in the home consumer market,
> and they may reckon (correctly) that people there prefer to install
> Linux themselves - hence the lack of even single-boot Linux consumer
> machines.

I wouldn't totally dismiss the conspiracy theory.  It *has* been proved that
Microsoft's OEM license meant that box-shifters had to pay for a Windows
license for every box they shifted, not for every copy of Windows.  That, of
course, was close to being a 100% disincentive for box-shifters to sell
*anything* but Windows.  That license clause has now been removed - I
believe it was the subject of an earlier (than the current one) DOJ
investigation of Microsoft.

I do accept your point regarding servers vs. client machines.  While I think
Linux is fine for desktop use by people who are either used to Unix/Linux
already, or are not used to *any* system (in practice, it's the GUI which
matters), it is not yet viable as a desktop for a mass migration of Windows
users.  The problem is that while home hobbyist users may be happy to spend
a while learning and playing with Linux, corporate users cannot afford that
time, and home *non*-hobbyist users need a large incentive to spend it.

Of course, 'nude' machines are the best - all the savings of OEM bulk buying
with the flexibility to use decent software :-)  Remember the stuff
Microsoft put up trying to persuade vendors that customers who asked for a
'nude' machine had to be nasty people wanting to install an illegal copy of
Windows?  Bah!

Cheers
Richard

(*)My business card reads:
Richard Cohen
Linux and Open Source Software
Solaris Software
Sun Microsystems Limited
.
.
.



-- 
Gllug mailing list  -  Gllug at linux.co.uk
http://list.ftech.net/mailman/listinfo/gllug