On Tuesday 04 December 2001 1:12 pm, Jonathan Bacon wrote: [snip]
There are "tough business practices" and there is breaking the law. (Also when a business uses the business practices of a gangster shouldn't it be treated the same way as a business set up bg gangsters?)
I dont think they use the practices of a gangster. Unfair competition...yes...mowing down people with guns and torturing your enemies...no.
Hmmm, MS not torturing people eh? You've never worked on a MS oriented help desk have you? (Yes, that was a joke)
(believe it or not) through some decent products.
Which products do you think are good, why do you think they are good? Also do you still think they are good for the environment of a school.
I think MS Office is a good suite. It is well designed, works fairly well and gets kids using computers at an early age with a simple interface. IMHO kids need something that is simple to use and works as they expect it, and Office is pretty much this way. Also...most other office suites have pretty much replicated the interface (which is good IMHO). Yes it is expensive and yes it is closed and yes it is proprietary, but I am looking at the interface and the featureset here.
To some extent, I agree with you. Although my workstation is Linux, I do have ME on my laptop, and I do find the UI on office to be *comfy*. However, I think that there are a number of issues with the UI which people either gloss over or simply ignore because of the doctorine (speling was nefer mi strong poynt) that "Oh, it's a computer - they're supposed to be awkward" as well as the off-hand lack-of-annoyence at having to reboot regularly (which I find ME is really bad at).
Lots of flaws does not necessarily imply "not viable". It's more a question of can the "flaws" be addressed, IME changing how open source software works is far easier than with closed source.
Lots of flaws for a Linux developer/advocate = viable Lots of flaws for a Linux newbie = not viable
Here I agree that flaws in Linux are not good. Linux is Flawed!! Linux Apps are flawed!! (head down asbestos hat on). But never forget, so are - to a lesser or GREATER extent - are MS Apps. Let me re-state a point I made earlier which I think was overlooked. All this anger, frustration and general shouting being made regarding the NHS is not mainly aimed at MS but at our own government who are blindly following what MS say. MS are a business, who's objective is to make money. This is something they do very well. Our government's job is to provide us with an efficient NHS. This is something they obviously cannot do as they are now talking about increasing taxes to pay for it, and pay private hospitals to help it along. The fact that they have not even done enough research into the project before committing themselves to spending £70M that they cannot give reasonable responses to requests for informatiom from members of this and other lists is what I think annoys most people. The fact that this contract was with MS only meant that the medicine (pun intended) tasted just that little bit worse.
Like anything in life, there are varying levels of positive and negative. Microsoft does have its good points, and it does its bad points. Also, it is not like they are the only comptetitor out there for us.
Cheers,
Jono
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