[Dano]

I think Linux and Windows are two different animals. Everybody has their preference, and personally I don't think that it matters whether you choose windows or linux but what I do wish is that people would stop installing linux distros, expecting them to act like windows. To all newbies I would have to say "LINUX IS NOT WINDOWS-- GET ON WITH IT" .
Ok got that off my chest .
On a different note, I was once speaking with a former MS employee and his biggest lament is that windows was build by a myriad of different people each being oblivious to what the others were doing. Consequently he likened windows to a skyscraper that as it went up it started to lean and skew about because the upper floors were built by people who knew nothing about the foundation. Hmmmmmm.......

[adrenaline]

I agree mostly with Stormblazer - except I use Mozilla and not firefox. I like the mail client. Anyways I don't think Linux should try and compete. I think linux should produce the best OS no matter who else is in the game.
I think IE's down fall will be the fact that other people can write to your hard drive through the browser. That is BS and the only way IE will come out on top is if they can fix that and I don't believe they will be able to using windows explorer as the file browser. Which means IMHO that they will have to redesign there file system. BSD based?

I don't want Linux to compete if they will have to make it idiot proof. I think that Stormblazer said it best that if manufactures would get on the band wagon and write more hardware drivers that alot more people would convert, but I am really happy with it now. I would hate Linux to become windowsafied

Mike

[i_r_root]

Let's hear a round of applause for Firefox ~ cheers ~ :rock:

[mechmaster]

i agreee that firefox is the better browser and i am happy to see that most distros i have installed use it as the default browser. About IE, i think that it is a good competetor, but it still is a horrible browser. IE is a good choice sometimes for me because i have a cable modem and no AOL or MSN i just have windows, IE is the only way i can go without insalling something. But i do think firefox dominates the field by far.

[Stormblazer]

mechmaster: My whole point about Firefox was that Firefox is incredibly easy to install on Windows... And since it rarely needs updates like IE does, it's easily the better choice over IE on Windows too, in any environment except maybe a person with no net access, and no ability to move a 4MB file from a machine with net access to their main one. The only other possible reason to use IE is for ActiveX sites, but given the inherent security flaws in ActiveX, I would try to stay away from such sites unless absolutely neccessary.


adrenaline: Firefox is the next generation mozilla anyways, and still opensource and good, which is the important part.


Dano: Yes Linux and Windows are different, but preference only goes so far in this situation, unlike, say Gnome vs. KDE or even Linux vs. MacOSX. As I've said before, Windows is the only mainstream OS that isn't unix-based, making it hard for it to co-exist with other OSes on the market properly, and it means that everyone has to follow it's standards or ignore it, and as the other mainstream OSes get more popular, more and more companies will be forced to base things off whatever cross-platform standards you can still use on windows, making it less than ideal for everyone, not just power users and admins.

[smindinvern]

As far as firefox goes, I definitely agree that it is far better than IE, but at the moment, because of the propriety of Windows, IE is a requirement for installing updates, and considering how many windows needs, I think that it will stick around for a while longer. Though, once the general Windows-using population sees this, they will realize the advantage of open-source and many will then have reason and motivation to move. It's obvious that linux is a better system than windows, by far, but it's monopoly will be hard to overthrow and will definitely take time.