On Thursday 30 March 2006 5:44 pm, Jos van Kan wrote:
Linda Walsh wrote:
Clearly no one here understands the nature of 99% of Windows virii and how they could easily run on Linux if Linux had a full port of Explorer, ActiveX and the desktop libraries.
Absolutely. And if the sky fell down we'd all be wearing a blue hat.
Regards, -- Jos van Kan registered Linux user #152704
I am hopelessly lost here. ( Not aiming this at you Jos, ;- ) but I think I missed a couple of layers of this,um, erm, discussion (?) ) Why would anyone port Explorer ( I am guessing IE is the program?) to Linux ? And ActiveX either? Both of those programs/systems are owned by the MS company. They, I can assure you , have no interest at all in porting them to Linux, at least not any variant of linux that Linus would accept. And I believe he still owns the rights to define what is and isn't able to be called " Linux" does he not? I doubt he will go for "embrace and extend" or "envelope and smother.. " The Explorer functionality we have as in many different web browsers. Top of heap currently Firefox and Konqi, there were several variants from the Gnome groups that I used to use as well.. there are even text only browsers. In the event you wanted to check something and for security reasons you didn't want to allow anything other than text. Or perhaps you are a blind person who has no need of the slower speeds of graphics and do have a "reader" program to assist your web enjoyment... And if you really feel you have lost something by not having IE to websurf w/; well, your legally owned copy of IE can be installed and run, dangers from bugs or virii and all, tho only the user is in trouble. Not for the linux system itself. If you trash your user space you are NOT going to take the system down.. As a normal user you won't be allowed to delete or change vital Kernal parts either. A Commercial company called Codeweavers will sell you a way to setup and use your own legal copies of those programs and several others.. a nice sandbox that they spend lots of time tightening precisely so your warnings from a firewall ( Zone Alarum? ) are not necessary. As someone said, if you open your web browser , do you not intend it to connect to the internet? So why do you need a popup to tell you that it is doing so? Warnings you are being scanned or that someone is attempting to get into your servers or your personal computer ... that is useful.. and there are many of these programs available. As one of the group often says "google is your friend" in these instances. ( I apologise profoundly to the originator of that remark.. I've forgot your appelation. ) As for the firewall issue. Please clarify your usage of "firewall" as a program.. there are once again many to choose from , each distro usually packages one or more ... on a Suse system the builtin one is SuseFirewall ,possibly w/ the number "2" still part of the name... A basic locked down systems will be running from time of install of the distro by default.. ( some of the older versions required one to check a box during the setup for one's internet or lan connection.) At this part of my day I don't recall any more if that step is necessary in 10.0 ... If you didn't set it up on install of the distro, or wish to tighten the open ports it's easy to do in Yast (firewall settings areas IIRC). Of course as an old time user you already know you need root's password to do any of this , whether setup or just reading the info... The Vanilla version of the firewall and kernal have kept many many systems safe w/ the local users needing to know nothing more about it than that check box to start the thing. Even, I might add, while windows boxes all over were falling prey to Mellissa, I love you, and The series of "RED" worms that just blitzed Windows world up to and including the current one . If this isn't what you meant in your attempt to start a discussion , I suspect Anders is correct and I shall defer to his judgement in this matter. <aside to Anders et al > Sometimes, there needs to be translation from feminine usage to male or visa versa since it is abundantly clear the two halves of humanity do not intend the identical meaning and shadings of words, no matter what the National tongue . <heavy sigh> -- j It goes like this , the 4th the 5th , the minor fall the major lift, befuddled king composin' ( song lyric)