Tendo City

As far as I can tell from what I've been reading, all those great things about Vista that were supposed to make it worth getting are either being pushed to the version of Windows coming AFTER it, or being ported to XP due to their great demand.

Except for the visuals, those should be... shiny...

So why should I bother updating? Security? Turns out MS is trying to update security but is doing it the classic "very annoying and demeaning warning dialog" way.

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000571.html

MS, either get these issues fixed or I'm just not going to bother buying your new OS. It's too expensive to justify that sort of money on it, and since you seem to be planning on releasing an XP version of things like the Windows Defender, IE7, and DirectX10 anyway, my future games are going to be working just fine in XP anyway.

You'll upgrade because, despite there being absolutely no reason for doing so, MS will start making programs (applications, games, etc) Vista-only. Just to get your money. Like they did with XP...

Meanwhile, Apple has released 3 major versions of their OS since XP was released, with another to come before Vista finally makes it out.

MS released one update, Windows XP Media Center Edition, but yeah, they've got serious problems with delays...

It's still a far better OS than MacOS (Windows in general, but we've debated that before), but they do have problems with delays. :)

And Media Center Edition isn't that much of an update, it's just an added flavor with added fluff that has pros and cons. I prefer professional, due to the lack of the hooks taking up memory.

But honestly, there was good reason why some games needed XP. The OS was substantially different enough that making software for both 9x and NT became not worth it, and XP itself really was a major update over the 9x series. This however, they would have to "dongle" it and that's easy enough to get around.

By the way, last I checked Mac is still using OS Ten. If the new updates have really been that substantial, why didn't their naming convention reflect that? Are they so obsessed with how neat the X is that they forgo accurate naming just to keep it?

No matter, at any rate I'd be hard pressed to constantly BUY a brand new OS anyway. I've read about the little updates here and there, and honestly all I need my OS to do is run my programs. At the end of the day, that's all it exists to do, allow me to run my applications.

It's still OS X, but each point upgrade is considered a major upgrade. Right now they are at 10.4.6. Each 10.X.X upgrade usually contains bug fixes and security fixes similar to Windows Service Packs. Anyway, regardless of what you think about the "little updates" Apple makes to their OS, there are obviously enough people interested in the features to go out and buy it. They actually totally rewrote the Finder (Apple version of Windows Explorer) for 10.4, which is something Microsoft is taking years to do. I'm not going to try to sell you on Macs since we have had this debate before, but it does say something when a company actually gets you interested in buying upgrades as opposed to forcing you to buy them. I could still be running OS 10.0 and be able to do everything I can now, but I keep upgrading because Apple provides features that compel me to do so. I don't just see the OS as something I use to run applications, I see it as the essential application for my PC.

Quote: I don't just see the OS as something I use to run applications, I see it as the essential application for my PC.

Uh, of course... you spend a lot of time you your OS, it's the fundamental tool of your interaction with your computer... that's why I don't like Macs, as I said before. They don't do things better. :)

... yes, one reason I like Windows is because it runs games. But I also like the OS, and think that it works well... sure, my computer crashes, freezes, etc, but it works... 4 1/2 years old and it works quite nicely, considering...

Quote:It's still OS X, but each point upgrade is considered a major upgrade. Right now they are at 10.4.6. Each 10.X.X upgrade usually contains bug fixes and security fixes similar to Windows Service Packs.

Wait, wait, upgrades about as much as Windows' free Service Packs, which you pay for, and you call this a GOOD thing?

... Apple is just as much of a racket as Nintendo is! :D (eg: Pokemon, etc) ... just with much more expensive products. :)

Seriously Apple is like MS but smaller... yet they are "cool" just because of their design mostly...

Anyway, Vista. Yeah, most of the major features are gone or already in XP, but there are a few things making it worth getting, and it is a change... and there will be stuff added to it later for sure... there always is...

It's true, SP2 did pretty much rewrite a large amount of the core functionality of the OS, and it was free. Further, I was able to "slipstream" (as they call it/rip off Voyager) the update into the install files for XP (since the original installation is so open to virii that you can literally install it and be infected DIRECTLY over the internet without even doing anything and before you can install the latest update) and burn a new disk, ugly as it may be, so I can install straight up to SP2 fresh on my computer in the future, should the need occur. I'm not saying MS is god for doing this, I EXPECT as much actually, but it is something they do.

I decided to check out the updates added to the "cat family" updates of OSX, and to be honest, that sort of stuff is not worth paying for. The OS proper? Sure, I've heard lots of good things about the OS, as a system, and it sounds neat. But those updates? Not worth it. An updated search utility or, and this is just terrible, "added hardware support" in the form of supporting the new switch to Intel cores? I'm sure a lot of code was reworked for that, but that really should have been a free update, and yet they charge full price to update each time. Apple is master at one thing at any rate, extoring money out of people who won't settle for less. Only they could release music players with LESS memory and get people who have ones with more memory to actually willingly pay for it. And, need I mention the dreaded iLamp? A frickin' screensaver to read your book by, and that's worth MONEY somehow?

Sorry if I seem a little angry. I'm not saying the Mac as a system and as an OS isn't a good one. I'm just saying all that fluff just doesn't matter to me.

The OS runs everything, and so as I said it is central to the operation of the system. It is the layer between software and hardware, and should be designed easily enough that you can find your files and run your programs. Other than that, it's all fluff to me. And I say that marking everything from the browser to word processor as seperate programs and not really something I consider "part of the OS", even if there is integration.

There are clearly big issues with Windows that need to be addressed, and these, thanks to the new found stability of XP (and ABF, that is the main reason you would want to update) center around security and protection of the users from themselves. Mac users don't have to worry about screwing up their systems themselves because they don't have the ABILITY to do that. That's not really a bad thing. If I can run my programs well, I won't need to mess around with my OS, and if the OS is hardware locked, I really don't need such capabilities at all. Further, as the article notes, security on a Mac or Linux is pretty effective by just forcing a pop-up to appear to allow any programs doing admin'y type stuff to do their thing. This is something that has been lacking for too long and XP is only now starting to do that by including these warnings, to an extent, in the system, but they are limited in what they do.

Now then, there is one other aspect. Users need to start being educated more. A computer is meant to have a lot of different stuff used on it. It is a multipurpose machine, and that requires a certain level of freedom that will inevitably result in users screwing up any machine. The mac isn't even immune. Need I mention extensions? No security system, save completely locking out the function entirely, will prevent a user from "clicking here to see the cute bunnies". They will click on any "okay to proceed" box or type in whatever password is needed to get at those bunnies. So, education is the most important factor left if MS can get their act together in terms of security.

What's left is the fluff, which MS is adding to Vista, but I don't care about (ooh, glassy menu boxes, pfft yeah I'll be shutting THAT off immediatly, don't need any extra cycles hogged by my OS thank you). So, I pick my OS based on the fact that I know how to run a secure system, I can be trusted to tweak my OS at a deep level without screwing things up (most of the time), and that's the system all my games are available for. Also, I'm not buying an entirely new computer just for one OS, but I probably won't need to. Since OSX now runs on Intel machines, I can see someone creating a translation shell for the OS so it can run on PCs. All that'll be needed are the right drivers.

Oh yes, and MS is really in deep for not supporting the replacement for the system BIOS. The BIOS standard is fading and a new one is emerging. A lot of new OSes already support it, but not Vista. They wanted to but it was another one scrapped and pushed to the next OS. This replacement takes the entire driver layer and pushes it from the OS to the actual hardware itself. Driver updates and firmware updates will be synonemous, and drivers will be OS independant (to the extent that OSes at least need to support the standard and have their little communication layer communicate with "BIOS2" of course). One of the side effects will be that BIOS's replacement can actually look pretty for once :D. Of course this only concerns PCs, but it's a pretty big move on a platform that has as one of it's main features the ability to use whatever hardware you wish and interchange all of it. Oh yes, all those config utilities for all the high end hardware everyone's used to? That'll all be tied into the updated BIOS as well. If they do it right, there's hints that you could actually alter the new standard's settings from inside the OS itself, and thus would still have inside-os access to hardware settings, only without wasting memory on keeping the stuff resident like that (I imagine that a number of the bigger changes one might make would still require a good old fasioned restart though).

So yeah, Vista isn't supporting the new standard and as a result, BIOS and the new standard are going to be put on upcoming motherboards, so you can select between them (via either a startup keyboard comand or a little circuit switch on the board itself) when you turn on the system. It is stupid that they would have to resort to that though...

Quote:I decided to check out the updates added to the "cat family" updates of OSX, and to be honest, that sort of stuff is not worth paying for. The OS proper? Sure, I've heard lots of good things about the OS, as a system, and it sounds neat. But those updates? Not worth it. An updated search utility or, and this is just terrible, "added hardware support" in the form of supporting the new switch to Intel cores? I'm sure a lot of code was reworked for that, but that really should have been a free update, and yet they charge full price to update each time. Apple is master at one thing at any rate, extoring money out of people who won't settle for less. Only they could release music players with LESS memory and get people who have ones with more memory to actually willingly pay for it. And, need I mention the dreaded iLamp? A frickin' screensaver to read your book by, and that's worth MONEY somehow?

Ahh DJ, you forget the most important fact: Mac fans are utterly devoted. They don't care that they're spending way, way more, that Apple rips them off massively, that that's just because Apple wants bigger profit margins, etc... just read DMiller's post up there -- all kinds of exsuces for Applie's actions... but the core of it is, Apple knows that they can get away with it, so they do. Simple as that.

Quote:and ABF, that is the main reason you would want to update)

I've read enough about XP to know that it is not exactly the answer to all one's problems... maybe it's better in most ways, but it's far from perfect.

Quote:There are clearly big issues with Windows that need to be addressed, and these, thanks to the new found stability of XP (and ABF, that is the main reason you would want to update) center around security and protection of the users from themselves. Mac users don't have to worry about screwing up their systems themselves because they don't have the ABILITY to do that. That's not really a bad thing. If I can run my programs well, I won't need to mess around with my OS, and if the OS is hardware locked, I really don't need such capabilities at all. Further, as the article notes, security on a Mac or Linux is pretty effective by just forcing a pop-up to appear to allow any programs doing admin'y type stuff to do their thing. This is something that has been lacking for too long and XP is only now starting to do that by including these warnings, to an extent, in the system, but they are limited in what they do.

Now then, there is one other aspect. Users need to start being educated more. A computer is meant to have a lot of different stuff used on it. It is a multipurpose machine, and that requires a certain level of freedom that will inevitably result in users screwing up any machine. The mac isn't even immune. Need I mention extensions? No security system, save completely locking out the function entirely, will prevent a user from "clicking here to see the cute bunnies". They will click on any "okay to proceed" box or type in whatever password is needed to get at those bunnies.

There are viruses for macs... not s many, but they exist. And how good is Apple at fixing the holes? No better than MS, that's for sure.

Also, how is having the system be so locked down not a bad thing? It limits your options so much... it's like Firefox vs. Mozilla -- there is no benefit to having a system which is missing most of the options!

I'm not up to date on the firefox mozilla argument. What's your take on it?

The system being locked down IS bad in a few ways, namely the very one you mention. In the hands of someone who knows what they are doing, admin access is very desirable. I'm talking about the average user who has no idea what they are doing. I want to prevent my mother from accidently installing "bad things". As a result, if she gets a new game (like Dreamfall, which she had to find on eBay, and she's actually pretty upset at the new control system, admittedly I myself only played the game enough to confirm a correct installation), she has to jump through a few hoops to install it, and with some careful instructing by me, she knows that if the same alerts appear for something she sees online, either just let it be or call me to make sure it's okay.

And yes, Mac and Linux has viruses. Not nearly as many, but they do. The new Mac ads give a false impression that Apples are immune. They don't say it outright, but among the average user, that's the impression they will get. Even a mac should have an antivirus program. Well, a home user that is digilant can get away with it, but any business user will tell you that there is substantial risk which demands a protection program in such an environment. Same with linux. Don't underestimate the tenacity of jerks.

Locking a system down is the "straight jacket" of computer protection, and with the state of computer knowledge a lot of users seem to have, it has become the last needed step that an OS has. It limits the users, but it prevents them from hurting themselves. As such, lots of computer IT guys are supporting MS on their new stance of "off by default" stuff in Vista, just like Linux and Mac. The problem is MS's implementation of it. Too much annoyance results in users just hitting the "okay" button, and this applies to people that you would think know better like IT guys. The best idea is one presented there, copy the implementation of other systems. Whenever one needs to do something administratory, log in as an admin for that one task and only for that task, and the log in will be secure to the point that it requires a direct hardware action in order to occur, thus software can never just authorize itself (but of course it would need admin access to run in the background and authorize things anyway), and of course the most important thing, be much more intelligent about what is and is not a security risk, and remember what's been authorized before.

A Black Falcon Wrote:Wait, wait, upgrades about as much as Windows' free Service Packs, which you pay for, and you call this a GOOD thing?

... Apple is just as much of a racket as Nintendo is! :D (eg: Pokemon, etc) ... just with much more expensive products. :)

I should have clarified that the 10.X.X updates are free. Apple releases them to fix any known vulnerabilities or bugs they find, and they come out once every few months pretty regularly. The only updates you have to pay for are the major "cat" updates, and the Intel updates are not a part of the major updates.

Anyway, I'm not going to say Apple is perfect because they aren't. I was very close to switching to PCs in the late 90s because the Mac platform was horrible, but OS X is such as efficient OS that it is hard to use anything else, and I'm not talking about graphics. Something simple like the ability to press F11 and hide all the current windows, or F9 to see every window that is open makes the whole user experience just a little bit better. And the new search utility is great, and is the main reason I upgraded to 10.4. A quick search for "Nintendo" brought up the following:



As soon as you start typing it begins searching, and you have results almost immediately even on my 6 year old Mac.

And, yes, Macs do have viruses, but so far none of them have been malicious, and they were really more trojan horses than viruses since it took compliance from the user for them to work and they couldn't self-replicate.

If you like Windows better that's fine, but I use both OSes about the same amount now since we have PCs at work, and it is just too obvious how far Microsoft has fallen behind in terms of usability.

Also, Apple apparently doesn't know how decimals work either.

:)

Pretty bad, but the sad thing is, it's sorta true. Not really for that reason. But, there are viruses out there. That's why even a Mac needs antivirus, not as much, but don't fool yourself.

Pretty funny. That is the main reason there aren't any viruses for the Mac. Again, the only two known attacks against OS X have been trojan horses, not viruses. It is more difficult to write viruses for Macs because you need root-level access to do any harm, but it certainly isn't impossible. Most virus writers want to hit as many people as possible so writing a virus specific to OS X doesn't make much sense.

There in fact are virii out there for the Mac (including OSX). And, there are antivirus programs too.

Moving right along though, the only way to really get attacked by a virus is to LET it do the damage. There are other viruses out there that can actually worm their way INTO a system FROM THE INTERNET, and these have specifically targetted Windows because that's the one with those vulnerabilities. Fortunatly, SP2 patches these issues, for the most part. They should (SHOULD I say) be fully resolved in the next OS (the one I'm not interested in).

As for Macs, they seem pretty immune to worms, but they aren't immune to virii.

Ever heard of dancing bunny syndrome? Allow me to explain. Any virus can get into an otherwise protected system if a user turns off those defenses to let it get access. And, a user WILL do that if they are promised they can see a dancing bunny if they do it. It'll be part of the "documented installation procedure". "In order to see the dancing bunny, when you see this dialog: "Warning, this will allow the application administrative access. Are you sure? No really, are you SURE? You really shouldn't do this for any application you download online, and if it says anything about seeing a cute bunny, I would highly recommend just ignoring it. Seriously! LISTEN TO ME!" click "Allow" to see the dancing bunny.

People will click allow. Currently, the majority of virus infections in XP are from two things. The first is people installing SP1 or below on a machine and going online to download SP2. The problem is SP1 and below are vulnerable to the "install on your machine automatically just for being plugged IN" worms, the sort that simply weren't even possible back during the days of DOS so almost within minutes of getting it installed the system is already infected. The solution is either burning a disk with the SP2 install program on it and not connecting your system to the network until it is installed, or slipstreaming the SP2 install files into the install disk files and burning a sp2 install disk (which means I really like the "slipsteam" tech MS decided to implement because this is a lot less time consuming), but the problem is, of course, most users aren't going to be aware of this and can't be expected to, and MS has no feasible way of informing the majority of users to do this. They just have to accept that the past is going to be around for a while.

The second and the more dangerous of the two (due to the fact that this happens more often than installing or reinstalling the OS) is simply the dancing bunny syndrome of people using a fully secure system and deciding to drop their guard just to see the dancing bunny. This is basically social engineering type virus infiltration. It only works because people aren't educated enough to know better. Problem is, this does not just apply to Windows like the first one. This applies to EVERY OS. No matter how secure the system, if there is a way to drop the security (and there really HAS to be because people need to be able to use and customize a general purpose OS the way they want so there need to be ways to do this in place), if a user wants to see the dancing bunny, they will click and jump through whatever hoops the system throws at them to do it. It is really amazing how smart a user can suddenly become when it is time to destroy their computers. Part of it is the fact that a lot of these viruses (and a trojen horse IS a kind of virus, so is a worm, and all the other new fangled words they have for different types, and if you ask me spyware is also a form of virus, I define virus as any application you install that forces undesirable effects on the computer without your knowledge) will provide a little guide on how to disable the security. For example, if you want someone to grant admin access to an application, walk them through getting the admin access box up and typing in their admin password.

This is the final step in security as I mentioned before. The users can't be expected to remain ignorant when they have a system with such customizability before them. Customizability means problems, and users need to have at least a basic understanding of what a virus is, the security systems in place, and the ways in which a virus is going to try to trick them into letting it install itself.