Friday 10th November, 2006
According to this ZDNet Blog entry, an IBM-sponsored study claims that 83% of companies expect to support new workloads on Linux next year, against 23% for Windows.
It cites the recent moves by Oracle and Microsoft with regard to Linux as evidence of this trend.
I would never rule Microsoft out any race it wishes to take part in, until the race is truly over. One particular comment to this blog entry raises the interesting assertion:
Microsoft has obtained the expertise and assistance of SuSE in creating the migration tools that will ease the Linux to Windows transition. The path was already marked out.
Linux to Windows will soon be far easier than Unix to Windows has ever been. And companies can't wait for their chance to leap into the future.
I must admit, I find it hard to trust Novell's recent actions. I'm not the only one.
Saturday 28th October, 2006
Unfortunately the OpenAddict website seems to have disappeared.
Rob. March 2015.
A great article from Open Addict. This guy tells it like it is! :) This is very much a to-the-point article, there's no beating around the bush. This is first of a two-part article. I'm going to be very interested to see part 2. He is also very willing to defend his article in the comments (something I'm far too lazy to do).
Thursday 19th October, 2006
Thanks to Edward Snowden, it is starting to become apparent that almost all governments have a blatant disregard for their citizens' privacy.
Rob. March 2015.
Do you know what's running on your system? The Swiss government are mulling over plans to surreptitiously install trojans onto people's PCs so that they can monitor VOIP transmissions. A trojan is a hidden program running on your computer without your knowledge.
The application, essentially a piece of Trojan code, is also able to turn on the microphone on the target PC and monitor not just VoIP conversations, but also any other ambient audio.
The company claims that the software is able to skirt round any firewalls and evade detection by any antivirus applications already installed on the target machine.
Those claims in the second quote are a bit broad, and certainly not sustainable for the future. The worrying thing is, if the Swiss government is proposing it, what other governments are thinking about it?
The thing about proprietary software is that if a government decides it wants a way in, it's hard for a company, even one like Microsoft, to refuse. Think of the benefits they could gain if a government, wishing to monitor its citizens, decided to actively promote (or decree) the use of software from a single, controllable entity.
With Open Source software, all those little backdoors become visible. Even if you're not a programmer, they become visible to thousands of others who are, and who are conscientious, and who will talk. You still have a choice, for now.