Flwrite wrote:
[...]

I had written, "Gee whizzz, why can't I use Windoze????  (WCIUW?)"

Get it?

I do now, but then I've not had to suffer sms text messaging much... (:-))

Obviously, a more productive question would be, "Why *shouldn't* I use
Windoze????

And thus some good alternative research!...

You mean it will take forever until it finishes a process, which is at least
better than crashing.

Mandrake confirms:
-------------------

Recommended hardware for Mandrakelinux 10.0:

Processor: an x586-class or above processor is required. This includes

Intel Pentium I/II/III/IV, AMD K6/II/III, AMD Duron, AMD Athlon/XP/MP. SMP
multi-processor machines are supported.

[...]

Symmetrical Multi-Processing.  Resources exist regarding which
multi-processor motherboards are capable of SMP.  Probably not an issue with
my 200 MHz firewall computer.

Yes on all counts.

Also, the linux scheduler will keep 'interactive' tasks at a higher priority to keep a heavily loaded system still 'responsive'.

That's French for, "A separate version of Mandrakelinux 10.0 is available
for Athlon64."  After browsing their webpages a while, you learn to
translate on the fly.

They do have some 'interesting' Franglaise... (:-))


[...]

firewall, what is the method for firewalling the firewall-computer?  I found
the answer:

According to Mandrakelinux:

In over ten years of widespread use, only a few rumored
viruses have ever been recorded that affect Linux. This

[...]

That's a pretty strong selling point.  If they only had a few viruses, they
probably updated the operating system as required.  It sounds like any
"anti-virus software" for Linux is probably much less bloated than is
required for Windoze.

For linux, whatever 'exploits' very soon get fixed. Serious ones get fixed and publicised in just hours. There's very good communication through the linux community.

The virus scanners for linux are actually scanning for Microsoft viruses so that a linux system doesn't forward the junk onwards.

http://www.securityfocus.com/columnists/188  Linux vs. Windows Viruses - "To
mess up a Linux box, you need to work at it; to mess up your Windows box,
you just need to work on it." - Scott Granneman.  He continues:

Even if the OS has been set up correctly, with an
Administrator account and a non-privileged user
account, things are still not copasetic. On a Windows

[...]

Yep. Windows is by _design_ a single user system. Various 'add-ons' have been added to add incomplete multi-user capability.

Most of the security for MS systems relies on physically seperate client & server machines blocked by a firewall and various 'logins' for their file sharing. NT after many years was eventually patched up to something well known and reasonably workable.

Also, maybe it's on this newsgroup that I read that it's a badly kept secret
that WinXP has problems with different users logging in and logging off, and
trying to hot-switch between users.  I don't know if 2000 shares this

Yep. Caused me various strange problems... gave up with it.

problem.  I assume Linux has this issue well under control.

You can have thousands of users accounts on your box if you wish. You could even have a lot of them logged simultaneously!

The s@h servers run on linux for good reasons... (:-))

There's a function in Win98 that provides for separate users, but I've
always thought it was just a silly toy so everyone can have their own

Pretty much so. One user can still rearrange everything for everyone else. We have to enforce file restrictions by forcing users to log into a remote server to see their files. Everything on a local machine is just 'open public property'...


Look on alt.os.linux.mandrake.

Good luck,
Martin