OPEN SOURCE-What Billy doesn't want you to know...

[vsecades]

All right boys and girls, it's time for some enlightening news. Ever since the antitrust Microsoft trials, many of my peers, including myself, have watched with horrid discontent the manner in which Microsoft has continuously played the role of culprit, said to have come clean and then stab everyone in the back again. I am quite tired with them taking the Nazi approach, that whatever evidence that is trying to be presented against them, and we're talking about some really serious stuff (if not check out the News on Eweek.com, osdn.com, or any other non-windows affiliated news site), get's blamed on "members of the company who did not share in the all for one and one for all" dogma that Mr. Gates seems to be so fond. If I were the owner of Microsoft, yes, I would also be pooping my pants at the site of an open source software and GPL licensed software world. Where would we make the money? To what extent would it be economically sound to make such a switch? But isn't the fireman approach good enough for all out there (release sw, have it get hacked, attacked by viruses and issue their temporary extinguisher-a patch-till the next hole gets discovered)? Well no, not anymore.

What is a thread regarding this stuff doing out here? Well, cause I am just sick and tired of excuses, and having my pocket digged at every time that a new OS comes out, or a new version of this or that antivirus subscription that needs to be updated, or have my clients, without whom I'ld be pitching for pennies in the park, send me documents infected with viruses, or act as dumb lambs that do nothing other than follow whatever user-stupid (no offense, but the route that XP has taken was a bit overboard, with all of that "nice" wizard-everything mode) software that their enterprise throws at them.

For the past year and a half, I have been working Flash projects with open source alternatives like Apache web servers (NO IIS), PHP and PERL coding tools instead of ASP, and other open source alternatives (MySQL instead of MS SQL...$200 vs $2000....laughable), that in my honest opinion, are a as user friendly, require inexpensive or sometimes even FREE (yes, you pay $0 dollars, zilch, nada) IDE development tools, and are being supported by a community of thousands of programmers, beta-testers, support personnel, and countless followers of the technology. Although this is not an open declaration of war (Adobe and Macromedia don't make tools for Linux yet, although running them with WINE is interesting) against Microsoft, it is a very obvious cry of DISCONTENT against thier capitalistic approach to everything.

Foreign governments (Mexico, Peru, some European nations), have adopted or are considering adopting the software as an inexpensive alternative to save virtually MILLIONS of dollars in new licenses for all of their software titles every two to three years (both OS's like Red Hat, Mandrake and Suse, as well as office productivity suites like Open Office, KOffice and Sun's own StarOffice, are making the rounds, although they have not had such great acceptance due to the fact that unlike Microsoft, they don't spend MILLIONS ON ADVERTISING).

So, all in all, my complaint is the following...WHEN WILL THERE BE LINUX COMPATIBLE VERSIONS OF FLASH, DREAMWEAVER, FREEHAND, FIREWORKS, ACROBAT AND PHOTOSHOP? (I'm not asking them to give their tools away, Macromedia makes excellent web tools, and Adobe's print editing tools are top in their category, but rather let us port our work over to other platforms...Please?) I'ld like to hear your opinions on this matter. Cheers.

[[-S|NiStEr_MiNd-]]

You can use all those applications on Linux using a windows emulator. There's several different ones I believe, and they run very well.

[vsecades]

As I mentioned in my post, assumed that WINE, or similar apps could be able to handle it. Do you currently use any macromedia or adobe products like this?

[[-S|NiStEr_MiNd-]]

I haven't tried it with Flash MX yet, but I have used Flash 5 and Photoshop. Didn't really have any problems.

[vsecades]

And what did you use, WINE...or what? Online resources for configuring that stuff?

[[-S|NiStEr_MiNd-]]

Yes WINE. Here you go:

Photoshop
http://franksworld.net/wine/pages/apps045.html

Flash
http://franksworld.net/wine/pages/apps094.htm

And the main site if you're lookign for more info on WINE and the apps you can run in it
http://franksworld.net/wine/

[snowdude]

Since Flash MX runs natively on Mac OS X - how hard would be to port over. I mean if it's already running under freeBSD - it can't be that hard - can it?. I'm sure it wouldn't take much from Macromedia.

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Anyways, Yes - I've been following all the coverage on ZDnet and other sites of the anti-trust case lately. And well, I'm not sure how any educated consumer could ever willingly or forcefully purchase an MS product. Every time they where to do so they'd be; 1: throwing their money away. 2: crippling inovation. 3: securing higher prices for themselves in the future.

The only MS product that has a decent amount of competition is the XBox. And look what's happening with that at the moment - Prices where just reduced by 1/3 cause Sony reduced it's price on the Playstation.

If MS had competitors for Office/Windows - The price would be about 1/2 to 1/4 of what it is now. And not only that, They'd be much much better products!!!!!

I wish sony or even Nintendo would come out with an OS - I mean why not. Playstation's not that far off. I bet Sony would come up with something really good. I don't see anything complex about an Operating system except for how parts like the Browser, Media Player, etc are all tied to core of the system - Which is why modular windows would be a really good thing - and why MS is so scared of it. Anyone could compete and we'd all have better OS's.

Never buy MS Office or Windows - If you care at all about your money. Or even if your a fan and just want to see them actually improve their product.
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As far as licensing:

I think the BSD style license is a bit better for the economy and inovation then the GPL. Reason being is that it gives the company a little bit more of a reason to inovate. That's only for certain situations though. The GPL is good when it's not so much of a product in question but rather a scripting language or something that needs to be open for everyone to use.

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Overall if you compare spoken langauges to computer software/languages.
1) I do not want to pay just to speak a certain langague.
2) I want to be able to speak anywhere I want to.
3) I do not want to be prohibited from translating my works to another langague.
4) I want to be able to create my own parts and new ways of speaking in that language - even if it's jive ha.
5) I want to Know what the words I'm speaking really mean and not just where to place them in a sentence.
6) I want to know if I'm using a bad word right away, and not just be updated 4 weeks later with a patch. Wouldn't want to offend anyone..

Anyways Open-source gives you that. MS does not. Open source is democratic where free speech is a way of life and basic right. MS is more of a dictatorship - much like Hitler - everyone has to look and act like me or die.

When I publish my book (website) - I expect to get paid for the creative arrangement of words and their format. I don't expect to have to pay just to use those words and at the same time be restricted from speaking them elsewhere - I also wouldn't want my client to pay for the rights to use those words.

.Net is a bunch of crap. Much like Flash remoting.. 5 Billion in Marketing, 5 hours in development. Reverse that for Open source....

[jstarkey]

Originally posted by vsecades


Do you currently use any macromedia or adobe products like this?

I'm running Flash MX, Swift 3D and a few previews on VMware. Works great.
[Edited by jstarkey on 05-16-2002 at 11:32 PM]

[dazza3]

BUY A MAC

[jkinstle]

Originally posted by dazza3
BUY A MAC

Oh, Apple's pretty much just as bad. On a recent call to Apple:

ME: I'm interested in buying one of your cinema display monitors, but I have a connector question for you.

APPLE: Plug in the ADC. It's that simple.

ME: Well, I was also interested in using the display with Windows and Unix devices and...

APPLE: If you're not going to buy a Mac, you don't deserve to use one of our monitors.

The Apple agent then just hung up on me.

[dazza3]

AS I SAID BUY A MAC

[[-S|NiStEr_MiNd-]]

I might buy a Mac as a second computer for testing sites, but I definately would NOT buy one to use as my main computer. bah!

[Subway]

I might buy a PC as a second computer for testing sites, but I definately would NOT buy one to use as my main computer. bah!



Fredi

[dazza3]

Horray!!
Macs are great, anyone who argues is an arse

[[-S|NiStEr_MiNd-]]

Well then just call me an arse :P

[dazza3]

you are an arse

[[-S|NiStEr_MiNd-]]

But i'm an arse that gets his job done well. So I figure use whatever tool you wish, as long as it suits you and your needs.

[gerbick]

I agree with the original poster. I'm getting tired of the having this supposedly tested software end up with patch, upon patch to cover exploits, that usually mean more will be found. And not by the people directly associated with Microsoft - read: hackers.

Linux/MySQL have had a couple of patches that were deemed necessary, but the platform has served me well. As far as using Windows products on it... no need. I have a couple of PC's.

As well as a Mac. Used to have two - but I'm waiting out on the upcoming macs to get another desktop. But I love my iBook.

And the port from MacOS X to Linux should be rather effortless. Of so you would think.

guys. chill with the name calling. or this thread will be arsed out, and closed/deleted.

[kornp]

In my opinion, mac or pc, who cares! Use what YOU like, don't think that others are wrong for using something other than what you do, it's called freedom of opinion.

And as for go anti microsoft, well, I'm all for it, if you can get a better product elsewhere for less money then do it! If flash / photoshop etc. ran on linux natively I would probably never own a windows PC again, but seeing that my PC is slow and crappy, which would probably make windows emulation under linux too slow, it looks like I'm stuck with MS for now .

For web hosting though, I see no reason at all to go MS in any way personally. I currently have 2 linx servers and am working on setting up a sun server. Any problem I have had has been easy to fix due to the massive support base on sites like http://www.linuxjunior.org and http://www.linuxnewbie.org I haven't found a single site like this for windows yet that's good, yet there are a lot for linux...but it's not for me to decide what you should use.

MS's comany practices though need a major improvement in my mind.

just my 2c