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Re: Back to Windows??



Hans Verschoor and Jennie Kohsiek wrote:

> Bud,
>
> I have the same bitter experience as Jan has: a printer that does not work,
> a tape streamer that does not work, no way to get an ADSL modem running
> a.s.o. Many of the responses to posters of the sort of messages like Jan's
> mention issues like "recompile  this or that", "check the order of this and
> that", "be sure that xxx is loaded before yyy" and other "advice" like that,
> which in practice screws up the machine even further. That's the way it goes
> with Linux, just be objective and read the mail archives .....

Perhaps you could buy a system- with printer, communications hardware, etc.-
from a vendor that pre-installs Linux?  If you're considering W2K, you probably
know that you can get quite a hardware setup for the cost of W2K and associated
software alone.

> In my case I got frustated beause I had a relatively simple goal when I
> tried to install my machine:
> - A firewall
> - A webserver with an application server, in Java
> - A data base
> - A facility to save the database contents
> That's just it. I don't want to hack in kernels, I don't want to invent new
> spooling systems, I don't want to be a whizzkid, I just want an application
> server on the Internet. I not in the anti-Microsoft lobby, I'm not in the
> pro-Microsoft lobby , I just want a simple machine ruuning simple tasks in a
> reliable way.

It sounds like your biggest problems involve trying to get Linux into a setup
that doesn't want to accomodate it.  See above re pre-insallation.

Then there's software.  Firewall is easy, just install the ipmasq package and
open up as needed.  Web server is easy, app server is not hard (I'm thinking
Zope), but I can't help you with Java on the app server.  Databases are also not
my specialty, I'm afraid, but OSS options do very well in feature comparisons
with the big names, and the big names run quite well on Linux.

Also, have you looked into 3rd-party support options?  The biggest problem there
is probably certification/trust, unless you go with a big name like SuSE or
LinuxCare.  It could cost some, but if you clearly identify the problems, it
will probably be less than the man-hours for internal development.

And of course, because the code is open, the support personnel could actually
make changes to it.

Zeen,

-Adam P.

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