Reply #52: No offense but... [View All]

To each his own. Windows XP does everything I need it to, and I'm an IT guy. I've played around with Linux enough to get it up and running (I do have a VM of it but I don't do much with it) but then felt like "Uh, OK, now what can I do with it that I can't on XP?" I don't do programming or kernel hacking and so open source doesn't mean much to me. I feel like I should probably experiment with Linux solely because it seems to be gaining traction in the data center (and so perhaps knowing more about it would be beneficial to my career), but personally I have little to no interest in it (and I don't mind working from the command prompt; I prefer it actually).

Once you have XP customized and configured my way, it runs fine. I have absolutely no complaints with it on the five computers I work with which run XP. Vista sucks, I'll admit, for 2 reasons: it's a resource hog, and the menus were rearranged for no apparent purpose. And so I hope Microsoft learns from the mistake and makes Windows 7 the next true successor to XP.

I don't mind Linux itself but I do mind the snotty attitudes of many of the Linux fans I've known (not here of course but elsewhere) who have sneered at me for being stupid to use Windows, who have told me I must kiss Bill Gates's ass, I'm not really an IT guy if I don't worship Linux, why must I be a sheep for liking something they don't, etc. I suppose that makes it difficult for me to muster much enthusiasm for their operating system of choice. These folks simply love to claim Windows crashes constantly, is slow, always gets hacked, always gets viruses, etc. Not true. The only times I have ever seen a Windows machine infected with a virus was when someone deliberately installed some crud they downloaded from the internet (pirated software). If you set up AV software and make sure it updates, you're fine. I simply don't spent any amounts of time worrying about viruses (or any of the so-called vulnerabilities like the painfully absurd Adobe .pdf vulnerability nonsense which is just a cry for attention from Adobe as far as I'm concerned). The Linux types I've seen have basically called me a liar for saying that; according to them Windows admins spend 95% of their time fighting viruses. Talk about FUD. And none of the Windows machines I've owned or worked with have ever been hacked. A simple firewall, which should be in place on ANY system regardless of the OS, works wonders.

Not only are the claims of Windows inferiority grossly (and shrilly) overexaggerated by some, I simply haven't found Linux to be the awe-inspiring savior of man that it's been hyped as. I've worked with Linux machines in my employment and they do crash. They do have hardware problems (in fact my current employer has a mix of Linux and Windows machines - the Linux ones have constant display and mouse problems. Constant). They do need to be patched for vulnerabilities. And so forth.

To me the OS is just a preference; none "suck" and none "rule." Whatever meets your needs. Nothing against Linux, but it is chocolate and I prefer vanilla.