WannaCrypt Makes an Easy Case for Linux

Fact is, since quite a few of the Internet servers are built using a Linux Server OS, why are they not designed to stop the spread of these type of infections in the first place? It seems to me that for something that is used as the backbone of the internet, the back is pretty weak.

Dear Gawd, this is quite possibly one of the most ridiculous arguments I've ever had the intense displeasure of reading, you can't be serious. Perhaps if the OS was as susceptible to infection as Windows than it could fall over before the virus reached the fragile Windows machine?
 
But that is not the real issue here. The real issue is what kind of money that equates to. You think that more little people using windows is what makes this turn. It is not, it's the huge money that businesses and governments pay MS for their Enterprise services, of which, desktop OS's are a small part. The business world pays MS so much that all the little people are just along for the ride.

You also don't have it quite correct. Take a few min and go through Microsofts financials. Advertising is MS future. Which likely explains why people are finding windows enterprise group policy tools meant to turn advertising server communication off don't seem to work anymore.

When you go through their numbers the picture is clear. They claim windows profits are up 5%... but pro is up 10% and non-pro is down 1%. In other words they goosed their profit numbers my making a bunch of cheap pro upgrade deals with oems. If you look at their Q3 numbers advertising makes just less then half the amount of profit of ALL windows OEM skus. Windows sales grow or drops 2-5% every quarter for the past number of years. Advertising has been growing in the double digits every quarter until the most recent one. They only claim a 5% bump this quarter for their advertising numbers, but MS reporting is a bit shady as they may have spent some money and applied it to the one division showing crazy growth. They still claim a search revenue growth of 8%, "primarily driven by growth in Bing, due to higher revenue per search and search volume." By microsofts own numbers Advertising makes them more money then non-pro windows sales... and advertising also makes them more money then Enterprise windows sales.... and within a year or so if their growth holds steady at 5-10% per quarter advertising will make more profit for MS then ALL versions of windows sold combined.

So yes the real threat for MS is Google... and I don't think MS has a real plan in place to battle them. Google has been going the slow and steady seep into everything route. However at some point they are going to notice MS moving into the lucrative Google fuelling market of advertising. Google is likely to build and push a full on desktop OS and push MS out for no other reason then to protect their cheddar. (no Google spying on us isn't better) Just seems MS is almost begging Google to make the push.

As for converted schools giving up on ChromeOS... frankly not a chance. Teachers Love it... School Tech support love it... Students know it and are used to using Chrome and the web for everything... Education Software companies LOVE it cause they can base everything on the web and save a fortune on support ect... administrators LOVE the savings. The chances of a school that has converted to ChromeOS going back to a software site licence setup with MS is pretty much zero.zerozeroone. :) There is very good reason they lost that market in less then 3 years. Windows -s isn't going to do much accept perhaps slow the flow slightly... without it they would likely have dropped to 10-15% this year with it they may if -s does well level out at 20%. Perhaps.
 
OK, I'm not with you here at all.

Windows update is simply not the great big pain in the ass you claim it is. Oh it's true, once in awhile I want to log off and go to sleep and update wants to do it's thing. It's also true, once in awhile I wake up and it's waiting to great me. But it's not like this all the time and it's usually not that terribly inconvenient, it's occasionally inconvenient. It's never once bricked my machine, and it's never once cost me data. And I update drivers enough to know it doesn't always require a reboot so maybe that issue with your ALPS Driver isn't a Windows issue but an issue with the manufacturer of your touchpad and their software.

And on the flip side, that again, too many people want to gloss over and ignore, MS big customer is not Joe SixPack but the Enterprise customers and they patch at night or during off-peak hours, they use WSUS, and they rarely have serious problems that couldn't have been avoided if they had tested things first. Look you can argue all you want but it is not going to change these facts, MS completely dominates the business world on the desktop, and it's not going to be easy for any company or OS to change that.

And where did I say anything about Linux taking over the business world on the desktop?

Yes, most companies use SCCM or WSUS. Where I work it's complicated. SCCM is only now rolling out (not all systems have it yet). Because of the previous company structure the part I work for was under a special umbrella and we did our own IT work. I inherited a network of about 200 people. 100 on corporate hardware on our own domain and 100 on government hardware. Updating the government hardware is not my problem while updating the other 100 systems is. Like I said I inherited this system. There was no WSUS in place. I helped put in place the policies to modify the umbrella structure so that we were able to put our machines on the corporate network and thus take advantage of SCCM (and many more things we didn't have access too). But until that rollout is complete the systems still rely on updating themselves. Even though SCCM can force updates behind the scenes it's still a pain for users. All we have are laptops. That means users get prompted to update before leaving when they start their shutdown or they get forced to reboot when they walk into the office. Yeah...that doesn't go over well at all. Users are most definitely inconvenienced. There's no denying that.

In terms of our offsite users (we have quite a few) we have to trust that they update their systems and as I mentioned in a previous post some don't. Those who don't hate dealing with it because they see it as a hassle.

Do I even have to bring up all the home users out there who before the Creators Update were getting random reboots from Windows Update with no warning. My wife got 3 of them while working on grad school paper.

I'm not saying Linux is superior (it is :p ;) ) and needs to replace Windows (not that I wouldn't mind that of course ;) ). All I said is Windows Update is a slow ass mess that sucks hard compared to how Linux updates. Linux has never once rebooted on me for the sake of updates. Most Linux updates don't even require a reboot, unlike Windows which needs to reboot at the drop of a hat. For an OS like Windows to have such a poor update mechanism is honestly sad and depressing.
 
Bottom line the update process in Windows blows.

Ok it blows. But all I almost ever have to do is once or twice a month press a button and then reboot sometime later. That's it. That's all almost anyone has to do. It's not perfect but what some are describing here is essentially non-functional. And yeah, I'm considering EVERYTHING I have to update. I spent more time rebooting and messing with drivers figuring out this Brio camera than probably will have to deal with updating all of my Windows machines for a year.
 
Ok it blows. But all I almost ever have to do is once or twice a month press a button and then reboot sometime later. That's it. That's all almost anyone has to do. It's not perfect but what some are describing here is essentially non-functional. And yeah, I'm considering EVERYTHING I have to update. I spent more time rebooting and messing with drivers figuring out this Brio camera than probably will have to deal with updating all of my Windows machines for a year.

So you have your windows 10 automatic updates bypassed and shut off then ? What is this push a button stuff. lol
 
So you have your windows 10 automatic updates bypassed and shut off then ? What is this push a button stuff. lol

You can check for the updates anytime you want to by clicking "Check for updates" in the "Updates & Security" area in "Windows Settings" and will come up, be downloaded and installed. I you want to just update the Windows Defender definitions open Windows Defender, click on the "Update" tab and then click "Update definitions". You can also leave your system on and it will check for, download, and install updates on the schedule you have selected.

I tend to check for updates using one of the above methods rather than waiting for the "hands off" approach.

It's really not that exotic and it works well for me.

Hope this helps.
 
You can check for the updates anytime you want to by clicking "Check for updates" in the "Updates & Security" area in "Windows Settings" and will come up, be downloaded and installed. I you want to just update the Windows Defender definitions open Windows Defender, click on the "Update" tab and then click "Update definitions". You can also leave your system on and it will check for, download, and install updates on the schedule you have selected.

I tend to check for updates using one of the above methods rather than waiting for the "hands off" approach.

It's really not that exotic and it works well for me.

Hope this helps.

So MS has auto updates that still have to be scheduled ? lol Ok fair enough....

I didn't think you would have to wait for a hands off option to do its thing. When a Linux distro pushes updates... they don't auto install but pretty much every distro has a update applet that will light up and let you know updates are there if you want them. Thanks for the info I ran windows 10 for a very short time... just reinforces what we all know I guess Windows update is dated in so many ways.
 
So you have your windows 10 automatic updates bypassed and shut off then ? What is this push a button stuff. lol

Patch Tuesday. I've never seen the monthly cumulative patch come out, install and reboot a system anywhere near real time. On patch Tuesdays I press the update button on my machines, get the update and then reboot usually when installed. Sometimes there'll be an out of band patch that again will never download, install and reboot in real time. And with the Creators Update if that did ever happen in real time you do get the option to delay the reboot up to three days.
 
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So MS has auto updates that still have to be scheduled ? lol Ok fair enough....

I didn't think you would have to wait for a hands off option to do its thing. When a Linux distro pushes updates... they don't auto install but pretty much every distro has a update applet that will light up and let you know updates are there if you want them. Thanks for the info I ran windows 10 for a very short time... just reinforces what we all know I guess Windows update is dated in so many ways.


You should reread the post:

1. You can manually check for updates at any time, just like in Linux, by clicking "Check for updates" in the "Updates & Security" portion of the "Windows Settings" area. This will cause any available updates to be downloaded and installed.

2. If you just want to update the definition for Windows Defender then you can open that program, click the "Update" tab and then the "Update definitions" button.

3. You can also do nothing, leave your system running, and updates will be searched for during the period you have scheduled for automatic updates.

Again, hope this helps.

EDIT: The automatic updates gives a person the ability to schedule the function to occur when the machine should be idle and not being actively used. You can leave it at it's default time, but if you do it might update at an inconvenient time like when you're working. I schedule mine for the middle of the night and then don't leave the system turned on so I can manually do the updates at a time I choose. I'm retired so it makes me feel important. :D
 
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Thanks for the info I ran windows 10 for a very short time... just reinforces what we all know I guess Windows update is dated in so many ways.

Dated perhaps, again, what is the failure rate of the process. With 10 I just haven't seen any big issue with it. With hundreds of other things that update on my systems the more it works without a lot of thought the better.
 
You should reread the post:

1. You can manually check for updates at any time, just like in Linux, by clicking "Check for updates" in the "Updates & Security" portion of the "Windows Settings" area. This will cause any available updates to be downloaded and installed.

2. If you just want to update the definition for Windows Defender then you can open that program, click the "Update" tab and then the "Update definitions" button.

3. You can also do nothing, leave your system running, and updates will be searched for during the period you have scheduled for automatic updates.

Again, hope this helps.

Of course, if you're PC is switched off during the scheduled update period and you carry on blissfully unaware that an update is pending, eventually Windows takes over and applies that update no matter what, at whatever time it deems appropriate.
 
Dated perhaps, again, what is the failure rate of the process. With 10 I just haven't seen any big issue with it. With hundreds of other things that update on my systems the more it works without a lot of thought the better.

Because your sample group is either based on a tightly controlled corporate environment or is very small. As someone exposed to a much greater sample group, Windows update issues are far more widespread than you make them out to be.
 
Of course, if you're PC is switched off during the scheduled update period and you carry on blissfully unaware that an update is pending, eventually Windows takes over and applies that update no matter what at whatever time it deems appropriate.

I just included an "EDIT" because I realized this very question would be raised. For me it's not an issue because I only boot the system up on a Patch Tuesday or whenever only after I have my pot of coffee brewed and I'm ready to do the updates. I'm an old retired s.o.b. so the angst I experience is negligible. I even check for updates on my Linux systems several times a day. It's part of my busy schedule. :D
 
I just included an "EDIT" because I realized this very question would be raised. For me it's not an issue because I only boot the system up on a Patch Tuesday or whenever only after I have my pot of coffee brewed and I'm ready to do the updates. I'm an old retired s.o.b. so the angst I experience is negligible. I even check for updates on my Linux systems several times a day. It's part of my busy schedule. :D

Mate, I get all excited and giddy checking for updates on my Linux PC's! Always something new and exciting.
 
You also don't have it quite correct. Take a few min and go through Microsofts financials. Advertising is MS future. Which likely explains why people are finding windows enterprise group policy tools meant to turn advertising server communication off don't seem to work anymore.

When you go through their numbers the picture is clear. They claim windows profits are up 5%... but pro is up 10% and non-pro is down 1%. In other words they goosed their profit numbers my making a bunch of cheap pro upgrade deals with oems. If you look at their Q3 numbers advertising makes just less then half the amount of profit of ALL windows OEM skus. Windows sales grow or drops 2-5% every quarter for the past number of years. Advertising has been growing in the double digits every quarter until the most recent one. They only claim a 5% bump this quarter for their advertising numbers, but MS reporting is a bit shady as they may have spent some money and applied it to the one division showing crazy growth. They still claim a search revenue growth of 8%, "primarily driven by growth in Bing, due to higher revenue per search and search volume." By microsofts own numbers Advertising makes them more money then non-pro windows sales... and advertising also makes them more money then Enterprise windows sales.... and within a year or so if their growth holds steady at 5-10% per quarter advertising will make more profit for MS then ALL versions of windows sold combined.

So yes the real threat for MS is Google... and I don't think MS has a real plan in place to battle them. Google has been going the slow and steady seep into everything route. However at some point they are going to notice MS moving into the lucrative Google fuelling market of advertising. Google is likely to build and push a full on desktop OS and push MS out for no other reason then to protect their cheddar. (no Google spying on us isn't better) Just seems MS is almost begging Google to make the push.

As for converted schools giving up on ChromeOS... frankly not a chance. Teachers Love it... School Tech support love it... Students know it and are used to using Chrome and the web for everything... Education Software companies LOVE it cause they can base everything on the web and save a fortune on support ect... administrators LOVE the savings. The chances of a school that has converted to ChromeOS going back to a software site licence setup with MS is pretty much zero.zerozeroone. :) There is very good reason they lost that market in less then 3 years. Windows -s isn't going to do much accept perhaps slow the flow slightly... without it they would likely have dropped to 10-15% this year with it they may if -s does well level out at 20%. Perhaps.

You realize that both Win10 Home and Win10 Pro are non-business versions of Win10?

Win10 Pro is not an Enterprise Edition and both Home and Pro are the only retail versions of the OS.

Furthermore, I never said MS doesn't have other revenue streams or that MS's Enterprise Support business is their largest business sector.

Someone claimed that the reason MS is the most prevelant desktop OS is because they make special deals with OEMs to prepackage the OS on all the computers.

My response was that this is not true, that the strength of MS business support services and enterprise sales of the OS make it a smart move for OEMs to go with Windows for all their machines.

Then a guy says that Enterprise sales are a small part of the numbers, which isn't correct to start with, but I say that this is only part of the picture because it's more about the revenues than just the individual sales numbers, mom and pop sales don't come with major service agreements, mom and pop don't spend money for training their IT staff, etc etc.

You bringing up that MS makes really good money from advertising these days is nice to know but it doesn't have an impact on this discussion that I see. Maybe someone else get's the angle, I don't.
 
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You realize that both Win10 Home and Win10 Pro are non-business versions of Win10?

Win10 Pro is not an Enterprise Edition and both Home and Pro are the only retail versions of the OS.

I was talking about their enterprise sales yes.

From their synopsis;
"Windows revenue increased $177 million or 4%, mainly due to higher revenue from Windows OEM and Windows Commercial, offset in part by lower revenue from patent licensing. Windows OEM revenue increased 5%. Windows OEM Pro revenue grew 10%, outperforming the commercial PC market, primarily due to a higher mix of premium licenses sold. Windows OEM non-Pro revenue declined 1%, outperforming the consumer PC market due to a higher mix of premium devices sold. Windows Commercial revenue grew 6%, driven by multi-year agreement revenue. Patent licensing revenue decreased 19%, mainly due to a decline in license revenue per unit."

They don't report the numbers of anything on its own because its MS and lying to investors is sort of what they do. They roll all versions including enterprise up into more personal computing.

Also from their synopsis;
"Search advertising revenue increased $81 million or 5%. Search advertising revenue, excluding traffic acquisition costs, increased 8%, primarily driven by growth in Bing, due to higher revenue per search and search volume."

So doing some simple math Search revenue is around 1620 million all versions of windows is around 2925 million. Or put another way Advertising right now for MS makes 55% as much as ALL versions of windows. So if we guess (cause MS would never tell) that MS has an even split between corp and oem consumer device business. Then Advertising dollars is = right now to both. Based on their growth patterns. (if you go back a few years worth of quarters you will see this is the first quarter that shows advertising slowing at all) If search continues to gain 5-10% a quarter it shouldn't take more then 4-8 (1-2 years) for advertising revenue to outpace the revenue from windows itself.
 
And where did I say anything about Linux taking over the business world on the desktop?

Yes, most companies use SCCM or WSUS. Where I work it's complicated. SCCM is only now rolling out (not all systems have it yet). Because of the previous company structure the part I work for was under a special umbrella and we did our own IT work. I inherited a network of about 200 people. 100 on corporate hardware on our own domain and 100 on government hardware. Updating the government hardware is not my problem while updating the other 100 systems is. Like I said I inherited this system. There was no WSUS in place. I helped put in place the policies to modify the umbrella structure so that we were able to put our machines on the corporate network and thus take advantage of SCCM (and many more things we didn't have access too). But until that rollout is complete the systems still rely on updating themselves. Even though SCCM can force updates behind the scenes it's still a pain for users. All we have are laptops. That means users get prompted to update before leaving when they start their shutdown or they get forced to reboot when they walk into the office. Yeah...that doesn't go over well at all. Users are most definitely inconvenienced. There's no denying that.

In terms of our offsite users (we have quite a few) we have to trust that they update their systems and as I mentioned in a previous post some don't. Those who don't hate dealing with it because they see it as a hassle.

Do I even have to bring up all the home users out there who before the Creators Update were getting random reboots from Windows Update with no warning. My wife got 3 of them while working on grad school paper.

I'm not saying Linux is superior (it is :p ;) ) and needs to replace Windows (not that I wouldn't mind that of course ;) ). All I said is Windows Update is a slow ass mess that sucks hard compared to how Linux updates. Linux has never once rebooted on me for the sake of updates. Most Linux updates don't even require a reboot, unlike Windows which needs to reboot at the drop of a hat. For an OS like Windows to have such a poor update mechanism is honestly sad and depressing.

I don't think I said that, "you were saying Linux would take over the world", I did say something about it being a tough thing to beat out MS's dominance, but anyway.

I sometimes wish I had your issues. Hell, I wish I could just download software and use it as I need. There are certainly some good things about working on networks that are completely isolated from the Internet, and if that were the only restriction, it wouldn't even be that bad. But imagine managing three separate isolated networks that each are at different classification levels so that data can only be moved in one direction. Let's say I do some changes on the one in the middle, I can take that work, say a script, and I can move it "up", but I have to recreate it by hand to move it down. And it's the network at the lowest classification level that is the newest and it's the one we are putting most of our time into. I do so wish I could just grab configurations and shit and move them down but everything has to be done from scratch the hard way and none of them are connected to the internet or even outside the building. It's a real pain sometimes.

Our customer is the government. When I started on this contract it was 2.5 years ago, they had no backup solution in place. It's a software development lab and they have no backup solution. It took us almost two years just to get tape drives purchased, the government did buy the drives, they failed to buy the software. 2.5 years we are still waiting for them to buy the software. The storage systems I manage are all near end of support, some have no maintenance agreement at all, no way to get replacement parts if something fails, and no backup solution......

Sometimes I want to run away before the day comes that is an inevitability, a massive failure and massive data loss. Not my fault, but I'm still the guy driving the bus.

I retire in just 5 years..........maybe sooner if this shit blows up in my face.
 
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You bringing up that MS makes really good money from advertising these days is nice to know but it doesn't have an impact on this discussion that I see. Maybe someone else get's the angle, I don't.

Well you seem to suggest that home users are just along for the ride. First we have no idea how the numbers break down for MS between enterprise and home sales of windows because frankly they don't say and haven't for years.

The angle is simple. What is driving almost all their choices right now are Advertising bucks. They see how much google has made and want in. Their way in is to force everyone into their advertising streams... even corporate clients.

Its going to likely lead to one of 3 possible outcomes;

1) MS wins everyone sticks with windows, we all become Windows -S and Edge browser users and make MS more money they they have ever seen through ad bucks.
2) lots of people get annoyed and more and more their dominate position will slip... and seeing as most of their ad money comes from forcing or tricking people into using bing they will fall with a large thud.
3) and what I believe is going to happen. Google will continue to attack them in the corp space with chromeos... and start launching things like ChromeOS terminals. If MS ad revenue doesn't slow down and start heading back the way it came... Google will fast track a full on Windows killing Desktop OS and as they did with Android entice a lot of Big name OEMs to play their tune. Again MS falls down goes thud.
 
Well you seem to suggest that home users are just along for the ride. First we have no idea how the numbers break down for MS between enterprise and home sales of windows because frankly they don't say and haven't for years.

The angle is simple. What is driving almost all their choices right now are Advertising bucks. They see how much google has made and want in. Their way in is to force everyone into their advertising streams... even corporate clients.

Its going to likely lead to one of 3 possible outcomes;

1) MS wins everyone sticks with windows, we all become Windows -S and Edge browser users and make MS more money they they have ever seen through ad bucks.
2) lots of people get annoyed and more and more their dominate position will slip... and seeing as most of their ad money comes from forcing or tricking people into using bing they will fall with a large thud.
3) and what I believe is going to happen. Google will continue to attack them in the corp space with chromeos... and start launching things like ChromeOS terminals. If MS ad revenue doesn't slow down and start heading back the way it came... Google will fast track a full on Windows killing Desktop OS and as they did with Android entice a lot of Big name OEMs to play their tune. Again MS falls down goes thud.


Well, you have it figured out ..... but that advertising isn't effecting the Enterprise clients so that part of their business is separate from what you are concerned with.
 
Didn't read this thread's replies and discussion. And, forgive me of ignorance, my knowledge may be outdated and if it is I'd love to know more/be enlightened. Here it goes:

Linux lacks centralized administration and management. There is no alternative that even comes close to the competency and wholesomeness offered by Active Directory and beyond.

This alone is a deal killer for Linux. Even if web-based apps are the only thing used.
 
Well, you have it figured out ..... but that advertising isn't effecting the Enterprise clients so that part of their business is separate from what you are concerned with.

Well it isn't supposed to... all though evidence lately suggests that it does.

Regardless from the numbers it clearly shows that Home versions of windows is worth more to MS then enterprise clients due to Advertising revenue. If your correct and 100% of that ad revenue is coming from non-enterprise clients. Then it further reinforces that MS can't afford to loose any ground in the consumer hardware space.
 
Didn't read this thread's replies and discussion. And, forgive me of ignorance, my knowledge may be outdated and if it is I'd love to know more/be enlightened. Here it goes:

Linux lacks centralized administration and management. There is no alternative that even comes close to the competency and wholesomeness offered by Active Directory and beyond.

This alone is a deal killer for Linux. Even if web-based apps are the only thing used.

ADDC would have to be one of the most overused platforms this side of Excel in my honest opinion, every time I see a small business set up with an ADDC for 10 machines or less I shudder. However, there are alternatives for Linux and I disagree wholeheartedly re: Your flawed opinion on Windows popularity not being based around deals with OEM manufacturers, it's blatantly obvious that OEM deals exist and the popularity of Windows has nothing to do with any conscious decision on behalf of the consumer.

Centralised Linux management: https://puppet.com/product/how-puppet-works

Try not to be so much of a Windows only tech, it will limit your career.
 
Didn't read this thread's replies and discussion. And, forgive me of ignorance, my knowledge may be outdated and if it is I'd love to know more/be enlightened. Here it goes:

Linux lacks centralized administration and management. There is no alternative that even comes close to the competency and wholesomeness offered by Active Directory and beyond.

This alone is a deal killer for Linux. Even if web-based apps are the only thing used.

https://www.samba.org/
https://www.freeipa.org/page/Main_Page
http://www.zentyal.org/
 
The animation/CGI industry use clusters of Linux based machines as well as Linux desktop front ends, all centrally managed.
 
it's blatantly obvious that OEM deals exist and the popularity of Windows has nothing to do with any conscious decision on behalf of the consumer.
Reminds me of the BeOS days, Be Inc offered its OS for free to any OEM and nobody took it.

Why? Simple, MS threatened each one of them that if they installed BeOS , even dual boot, they would get their windows licenses revoked.

The sad thing is, in those days, BeOS was actually superior to windows and pretty much we the customers lost a great leap forwards, technology wise.
 
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Reminds me of the BeOS days, Be Inc offered its OS for free to any OEM and nobody took it.

Why? Simple, MS threatened everyone of them that if they installed BeOS , even dual boot, they would get their windows licenses revoked.

The sad thing is, in those days, BeOS was actually superior to windows and pretty much we the customers lost a great leap forwards, technology wise.

I used to have a great .pdf highlighting Microsoft's underhanded business tactics, I'll have to see if I can find it...
 
I used to have a great .pdf highlighting Microsoft's underhanded business tactics, I'll have to see if I can find it...
Please do so, i want to see what the shills will say to debunk it!:ROFLMAO:
 
Didn't read this thread's replies and discussion. And, forgive me of ignorance, my knowledge may be outdated and if it is I'd love to know more/be enlightened. Here it goes:

Linux lacks centralized administration and management. There is no alternative that even comes close to the competency and wholesomeness offered by Active Directory and beyond.

This alone is a deal killer for Linux. Even if web-based apps are the only thing used.

Active Directory is based on LDAP which is readily on Linux. Currently, I use Open LDAP on my systems here at work. It provides a roaming user directory similar to how Active Directory works. It also holds a centralized account system for boxes to verify login credentials.

Not too sure how "outdated" your knowledge is, because LDAP has been around for decades.
 
Active Directory is based on LDAP which is readily on Linux. Currently, I use Open LDAP on my systems here at work. It provides a roaming user directory similar to how Active Directory works. It also holds a centralized account system for boxes to verify login credentials.

Not too sure how "outdated" your knowledge is, because LDAP has been around for decades.
And if you need to, you can bind linux boxes to an existing AD infrastructure.
 
Or incorporate a AD as a trust within a proper Linux setup. :)

Or use the same thing that's worked for years unless there's a real benefit to such a big change. There are organizations that have this down to a science with Windows deployments and maintenance. For places that are less capable, I really don't see how Linux makes it easier. Maybe but managing a large, global network securely isn't trivial period.
 
Or use the same thing that's worked for years unless there's a real benefit to such a big change. There are organizations that have this down to a science with Windows deployments and maintenance. For places that are less capable, I really don't see how Linux makes it easier. Maybe but managing a large, global network securely isn't trivial period.

Capable is all relative, 10 years ago clearly setting up Nix for smaller or medium size outfits would have been a pita, 5 years ago still would have been a tall order for most... these days though Linux know how is pretty strong with the IT masses. I am not even saying AD isn't a fine product.... just a much more expensive option and in many cases an unneeded one. Of all MS products AD is well liked and I am not knocking it... still if I have an outfit that is 50/50 nix running nix servers, I'm joining their windows boxes and in some transition cases you may simply create a trust for the old AD layout.
 
Capable is all relative, 10 years ago clearly setting up Nix for smaller or medium size outfits would have been a pita, 5 years ago still would have been a tall order for most... these days though Linux know how is pretty strong with the IT masses. I am not even saying AD isn't a fine product.... just a much more expensive option and in many cases an unneeded one. Of all MS products AD is well liked and I am not knocking it... still if I have an outfit that is 50/50 nix running nix servers, I'm joining their windows boxes and in some transition cases you may simply create a trust for the old AD layout.

We keep going down the same road with this. Plenty of organizations with capable IT have looked at desktop Linux over the years. Cost, support, etc., plenty of bean counters and technical folks have gone over it and over it again for years. If it were as cost effective and some claim, a lot more people would have done it already. The bottom line, Windows isn't nearly as problematic at the scale some claim it is. Again, if it were, no one would be using Windows.
 
So then, why did the Linux based web and email servers not stop this infection from spreading? The fact is, it made it all the way to the desktops from ground zero across Linux based servers which should be designed to stop it in the first place. Sounds like the Linux Web server OS could stand some improvement.

This is quite possibly the dumbest post on these forums I have ever read. Not joking in thr slightest.
 
This is quite possibly the dumbest post on these forums I have ever read. Not joking in thr slightest.

Not even close dude, it makes logical sense if you think about it for a bit. Seems to me then you have not read any dumb posts because the one you quoted of mine makes good sense if you think about it. Please, go ahead, give me a good reason why this could not be done?
 
Well it isn't supposed to... all though evidence lately suggests that it does.

Regardless from the numbers it clearly shows that Home versions of windows is worth more to MS then enterprise clients due to Advertising revenue. If your correct and 100% of that ad revenue is coming from non-enterprise clients. Then it further reinforces that MS can't afford to loose any ground in the consumer hardware space.

I have to admit, I have never considered this revenue stream previously. Perhaps times are a-changing .... yet again.
 
ADDC would have to be one of the most overused platforms this side of Excel in my honest opinion, every time I see a small business set up with an ADDC for 10 machines or less I shudder. However, there are alternatives for Linux and I disagree wholeheartedly re: Your flawed opinion on Windows popularity not being based around deals with OEM manufacturers, it's blatantly obvious that OEM deals exist and the popularity of Windows has nothing to do with any conscious decision on behalf of the consumer.

Centralised Linux management: https://puppet.com/product/how-puppet-works

Try not to be so much of a Windows only tech, it will limit your career.


In some circles, you will not work without it, and alternatives are not allowed. You have to know your clientele. My client insists on Security+ or better and without it, you don't work period. That is only one of their more esoteric requirements. There are many others.

The culminated aggregate of all these requirements is that I have less competition for work and as such, I remain employable while those who do not meet these criteria don't have a chance, and those who fail to keep up, are shown the door.
 
I have to admit, I have never considered this revenue stream previously. Perhaps times are a-changing .... yet again.

Really I never expected MS to do as well with their ad revenue as they have;
FY17 Q3 "Search advertising revenue increased $81 million or 5%."
FY17 Q2 "Search advertising revenue increased $177 million or 12%."
FY17 Q1 "Search advertising revenue increased $409 million or 40%. "
FY16 Q4 "Search advertising revenue increased $1.7 billion or 46%. "
FY16 Q3 "Search advertising revenue increased $538 million or 55%."
FY16 Q2 "Search advertising revenue, excluding traffic acquisition costs, increased $109 million or 17%"
FY16 Q1 "Search advertising revenue, excluding traffic acquisition costs, increased $127 million or 23%"

So based on that since the launch of Windows 10... their Advertising $ has spiked to say the least.

It should be interesting to see how it changes Windows development. I know I'm a MS hater so my pointing to recent reports of their enterprise group policy ad tracking setting not working sounds like more of the same coming from a MS hater. I may be willing to agree that could be some form of massive F up error type deal that they may well fix (if it effects more then just one specific build that was tested or something). Still I would have said the same thing you where saying a few years back... Enterprise windows drives windows development. Now though I'm thinking MS might be drunk on that add money, and if enterprise clients really aren't driving any of that revenue it does make you wonder how things may change.

Then of course there is the Google angle... everyone knows they have been toying with how to push Android to desktop mode, and how to expand ChromeOS. There have been rumors of a full on Google Desktop OS for a few years now. I would have to think if MS keeps gaining 1-2 billion a year in ad revenue from their OS search and ad tie ins.... they're almost begging Google to go after their Consumer device desktop market.
 
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Or use the same thing that's worked for years unless there's a real benefit to such a big change. There are organizations that have this down to a science with Windows deployments and maintenance. For places that are less capable, I really don't see how Linux makes it easier. Maybe but managing a large, global network securely isn't trivial period.

What kind of comment is this? You don't see how Linux makes it easier? Seriously?

I can set my deployments to a single batch file or bash script. Execute that baby and walk away. In 5 minutes, that deployment would have all of it's updates, all of its software installs, user accounts ready and permissions set.

Plus, you have tools such as Puppet or Ansible that you can use - both of which have web UIs you can play with to make management simpler.
 
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