Using Internet Explorer? What have M$ done for you lately?

[An Oasis]

Good old M$

Still beta testing after all these years. It makes me proud to say I have no intension of ever buying anymore of their products. I've been through windoz 3, 3.11 nightmare for workgroups, 98, NT (nearly tested), W2K and lately I've been forced to go to XP. Causing probably 100's of hours of tech support problems.

Read their latest horror story here.

http://www.webmasterworld.com/html/3222054.htm

 

[Dawg]

Are you saying "Hasta la Vista" has two meanings?

 

What problems are you having with XP that cause 100's of hours of Tech Support? Or are you just saying thay because you are Anti MS?

 

[Optegris]

It always makes me laugh these anti-MS type of posts, I've used MS products extensively for the last 4 years in business and the last 7-8 years personally and to be totally honest wasted more time trying to get drivers recognised and open source products working in OS applications.

It's personal preference and the argument that one platform is better than another is, quite frankly, boring

 

[KM-Tiger]

It's personal preference and the argument that one platform is better than another is, quite frankly, boring

Agreed, use what suits what you do. The important thing is that choice exists.

However, given this is a business forum, there is a valid debate to be had about Opensource vs Proprietary in business, but not at a "M$ sucks" sort of level. The issues involved are quite complex.

 

[An Oasis]

Are you saying "Hasta la Vista" has two meanings?

Yup adios baby

"What problems are you having with XP that cause 100's of hours of Tech Support? Or are you just saying thay because you are Anti MS?"

None now but when I used to run networks from 3.11 to NT, what a PITA

"It always makes me laugh these anti-MS type of posts, I've used MS products extensively for the last 4 years in business and the last 7-8 years personally and to be totally honest wasted more time trying to get drivers recognised and open source products working in OS applications.

It's personal preference and the argument that one platform is better than another is, quite frankly, boring"

Yar point taken, but these ar*e wipes are meant to leaders in their field. I can guarantee that if let your users beta test your products under the guise as fully fledged operation products you would be history! Hasta la Vista baby

Are you guys really telling me that it doesn't worry you that for 284 days IN 2006 there was a widely available exploit code available for unpatched IE users?

F*ck me any SME would die on it's arse delivering products or services to SLA like M$ do.

 

[AlphOmega]

Rather than the which platform is better discusion, how about the ethics of microsoft. They have been fined by the european union over vista already. They are seriously anti-competition.. Anyone remember that they leagally have to sell Windows Xp Lite edition in europe with media player. Well no one sells it. They have the product wheich they are legally obliged to do, but make sure they resellers do not stock it or advertise it.

Also they spend millions trying to stamp out the rise of Linux, with petty court cases about IP, which many they loose. Surely if their product is so wonderful they wont have to worry. Makes you think.

Oh MSDOS is a rip of someone elses work. XAML is a rip of XUL. Office was a rip of Lotus etc etc. They nearly missed the internet boat. What innovative thing have they ever done??

 

[mcarp555]

What innovative thing have they ever done??

What about single copy licence enforcement of XP? That was pretty innovative. Then again, so was the Inquisition...

 

[Maroculous]

business is dog eat dog world, don't tell there's one ethical business out there.

if microsoft is rubbish why is it worth a fortune.

i will admit it's costs a lot of money to run ms products but they do work, and work for a lot of people and i long to be one of those people who make a fortune from them

if you were bill gates wouldn't you think "i wish open source didn't exist"????

if only very guru programmer didn't want to destroy me with hacks, virus's and trojans etc???

 

[AlphOmega]

business is dog eat dog world, don't tell there's one ethical business out there.

If fact japanese business is based on ethics and respect

 

[darren atkinson]

Rather than the which platform is better discusion, how about the ethics of microsoft. They have been fined by the european union over vista already. They are seriously anti-competition.. Anyone remember that they leagally have to sell Windows Xp Lite edition in europe with media player. Well no one sells it. They have the product wheich they are legally obliged to do, but make sure they resellers do not stock it or advertise it.

Also they spend millions trying to stamp out the rise of Linux, with petty court cases about IP, which many they loose. Surely if their product is so wonderful they wont have to worry. Makes you think.

Oh MSDOS is a rip of someone elses work. XAML is a rip of XUL. Office was a rip of Lotus etc etc. They nearly missed the internet boat. What innovative thing have they ever done??

You make some good points.

Going a little off topic but the next company to be heading this way, and analyists predict that they will be even more of a problem is: Google.

Google are activley putting many businesses out of business.

For example Google Analytics, its great for us end users but companies who specialise in Web Analytics software have now been completely shut out of the market, (Why pay for their product when GA is free?). Google are being bankrolled by AdWords and are using this position of power to enter (it seems) virtually every market they can think of.

Back to the topic, I personally don't mind Microsoft products. Sure each new OS needs some 'bedding in' time but generally I after the first service pack things are usually much better.

One big gripe is that upon installing IE7 it managed to lose all my Dreamweaver site usernames, passwords, default folders. When you have as many sites as I have setup it was a big pain.

Darren

 

[An Oasis]

...Oh MSDOS is a rip of someone elses work. XAML is a rip of XUL. Office was a rip of Lotus etc etc. They nearly missed the internet boat. What innovative thing have they ever done??

AlphOmega = my hero:redface::redface::redface::redface::redface:

M$ = marketing

 

I love the way the majority of you use Windows as your primary OS yet you still put it down. I've never had much luck with Linux getting it installed or drivers for network cards - I've only ever used Ubuntu live CD and that didn't support my graphics card properly.

 

[Coding Monkey]

What have MS done for me lately? XBox 360

 

[DotNetWebs]

You make some good points.

Going a little off topic but the next company to be heading this way, and analyists predict that they will be even more of a problem is: Google.

Google are activley putting many businesses out of business......

I completely agree and have said similar things on here before.

Personally I think Google are far more of a position to abuse their power than Microsoft are nowadays.

.....What innovative thing have they ever done??

I think you have to give credit to Microsoft for getting us all using computers. About 10 years ago the PC became a mainstream consumer item. People who new nothing about computers could walk in to a high street store and buy a PC that would work out of the box. As much as I detest them, AOL were doing a similar thing with the Internet. Your average Joe would come home with his PC World PC and an AOL installation disc and be on the Internet within minutes.

Microsoft and AOL etc. made it easy for people to start using PC's and get on the Internet. This in turn helped fuel the Internet boom that put us all where we are today.

If Microsoft had not have been there and the only computers available were running Unix etc. The Internet would have spent many more years as something that was only used by the Military and Universities etc.

 

[leemason]

It is rarely if ever the best technology that wins out. MS success is down to great marketing and product placement making for an image that business is comfortable with. It used to be said that no one every got the sack for choosing IBM. MS are now in this position. It's the safe bet and when it goes wrong you can simply say that is't the defacto industry standard.

I think it's true to say that for most people running a few PCs XP is a good choice. However for larger networks and installations and high availability systems MS may not be the best choice.

I have to declare and interest and say that I am a Linux fan and use this whenever practical on servers and desktop/laptop systems.

As with others in this thread I do have difficulty with MS business practices and don't believe that their dominance in the market is good for the industry as a whole.

 

[andysears]

I cannot see the problem realy, MS and Google are businesses, why wouldn't they want to make money? andy if they are a success then they are bad?

They make their money because everyone buys their products. Although listening to some people you would think the opposite. Open source software, yes great idea, but in reality its horrendous, the very first page of websites for open source software give it away, technobabble everywhere, little or no install instructions, and way to geeky for most people.

 

[DotNetWebs]

I mentioned Google because I often find it ironic that people often slate MS for having a monopoly and privacy issues while at the same time singing Google's praises and using Gmail, Adwords, Analytics etc.

I personally haven't got a problem with either of them. I think it is fashionable to knock success. That's why a lot of people hate Michael Schumacher etc.

 

[-TJ-]

Try using Mozilla firefox if you have problems with Microsoft Internet Explorer. It’s just as easy to use, apparently safer, and there are thousands of useful add-ons + skins to download. Best of all its completely free!

 

[leemason]

When a version of Windows was released a while ago a lot of the source code was made public by a hacker. In this source code there were various sections and tags saying things like "NSA-KEY", "NSA-TAG", etc. MS were asked about these tags and refused to comment. I leave it up to the reader what NSA means or why they would want a KEY into MS Windows (and why MS would not comment on their function).

 

[wwdc]

MS must have done at least something better than any other competition: their sales and market share tells it all...

or was it just luck?

 

[Subbynet]

What innovative thing have they ever done??

The XMLHTTPRequest Object?

I must say I'm finding it hard to think of more

Anyways, the GP is way off base, XP WAS a problem when rolling it out in the corporate world, but those problems have been addressed.

If Microsoft had not have been there and the only computers available were running Unix etc. The Internet would have spent many more years as something that was only used by the Military and Universities etc.

Are you sure? ... What makes you think MS were the only company around at the time? Following IT history the only decent thing MS has done is bring it to the masses, but it was coming anyway, from many other companies all fighting for the same position at the time. (IBM, Apple, Xerox etc) IBM was always big on Personal Computers. MS got lucky by having IBM ask them for an OS - I bet to this day IBM wish they bought it themselves.

Microsoft wouldn't even be on the internet if it wasn't for the Open-Source (BSD Licensed) network stack included with Windows.

 

[Subbynet]

I love the way the majority of you use Windows as your primary OS yet you still put it down. I've never had much luck with Linux getting it installed or drivers for network cards - I've only ever used Ubuntu live CD and that didn't support my graphics card properly.

Funny enough, I had to install Drivers for my Nvidia Card when using Windows too...

Anyone else have this problem?

 

[DotNetWebs]

The XMLHTTPRequest Object?
Are you sure? ... What makes you think MS were the only company around at the time?

I was around at the time!

I agree personal computers would have gone mainstream eventually but I think it would have been years later had it not been for MS (admittedly with lot of help from IBM)

Regards

Dotty

 

[AlphOmega]

(admittedly with lot of help from IBM)

Real sad story that. Bill Gates was interested in Apple not the PC and he refused any deals with IBM at the start. The truth be known that he suggested some other company, this company quited far too much (forgot their name) and IBM put pressure on Bill to rip, sorry, build them DOS.

Also IBM's decision to allow their architecture to be copied made them the biggest name in the world, but also brought about there downfall as eventually cheaper asian companies undercut IBM's prices below what IBM could compete with, due to cheaper labour, rates etc from china.

Infact if you read the history its most likely there would be no microsoft if it was not for IBM. Then the Windows NT / OS2 war from Microsoft was just one example of how unenethical and generally backstabbing the comapny are. Nothings changed since.

Please note I do like some microsoft products (not windows) but out of principle don't ever want anything to do with them.

Oh MS screwd apple on processors recently. The powerpc processor is better than intels x86_64 but the powerpc now goes into the XBOX360. Someone please coorect me if this is wrong but my research tells me that MS forced an exclusive deal to have the PPC for XBOX leaving apple PPC supplier to turn their trade away. Apple have made song and dance that they have moved to intel for a better chip, but the reality is they had to find a new supplier, the chip is not as good. Ironically the company who makes PPC chips happens to be IBM!!

 

[leemason]

Without MS I doubt that the aboption of computers in business and home would have been any slower. Apple had GUI based operating systems long before MS. In fact Apple were not the first. Xerox produced a range of XPS workstations in the mid 1980s with just as good a GUI as MS have NOW. At the time it was known as WIMPS (Can't remember exactly what this used to mean but something line Winodws, Icons, Mouse + others). This was exceptionally friendly and at the time PC systems were MS-DOS or CPM only with no GUI.

In addition X-Windows has also been around for a very long time. The main reason why PC systems have been more widely adopted has been vast reductions in the cost of processing power with the power to price ratio halving every 18 months approximately.

The problem now is that we have MS very dominant in the O/S and application software market, with Intel being dominant in the processor market.

 

[DotNetWebs]

Without MS I doubt that the aboption of computers in business and home would have been any slower.Apple had GUI based operating systems long before MS.....

The thing is it is often not the first, or the best technology, that succeeds. It is often more down to marketing, vision and good deal of luck and I think MS had all of these.

For instance everybody remembers VHS and BETAMAX but who remembers the Philips Video 2000 system? I had one of these and IMO was far superior to its rivals.

My first computer was a shared ZX80. I then either owned or used most of the other home computers that were around in the 80's. When the PC came a long it was unique because thanks to the IBM open architecture it was the first computer that you could upgrade, modify or build from scratch. You could also buy, or dare I say copy, a copy of MS-DOS separately from the hardware. This meant for the first time home computers didn't have a finite life. You could upgrade the software and the hardware bit by bit. Your applications didn't have to die with your computer.

I think the early MS programming languages were also a major factor in their success, particularly in business. My first programming on a PC was with GW-Basic which was later replaced by QBasic. Things really took off with Visual Basic. This meant that business could RAPIDLY and cheaply develop their own in-house systems. There are millions of legacy VB systems still in use today (despite MS's attempts to get them to upgrade and kill off the original VB language!).

Anyway I don't want to sound like some sort of MS evangelist but I do think it is currently fashionable to knock them. I honestly believe they deserve some credit for accelerating the mainstream adoption of PC's in business and in the home.


Regards

Dotty

 

[KM-Tiger]

........... but I do think it is currently fashionable to knock them.

Personally, I don't knock their software, I use it every day, for many things it works well.

What I do knock is their monopolistic practices, and those that seek to tell me that that is what I must use. I don't allow single vendor lock-in in any other aspect of my business, and I won't with IT.