God's laptop

[Lyosha]

well what's an alternate spreadsheet? LibraOffice? OpenOffice? GoogleDocs? None of those are really in the same ballpark...

 

[MRoss]

where did you come up with this number? I mean have you done research to actually find out that there are 400000 programmers using windows? and if you did, from whom did you get the data from? How recent was this data? What type of programmers are they? What are they programming for?

I have not worked in the field, but my dad has for 30 years. When he worked at Chase - they all used Windows. When he worked at Goldman Sachs - they all used Windows. When he was a project manager at B&H, all the programmers used Windows. The list goes on.

 

[MRoss]

well what's an alternate spreadsheet? LibraOffice? OpenOffice? GoogleDocs? None of those are really in the same ballpark...

Back in the day people used Lotus 1-2-3. Since then the overwhelming majority has used Excel.

 

[Lyosha]

I haven't seen anything by lotus in ages...

 

[alain]

I do not hate Macs.

Apple OS I probably could live with. Its the hardware thats the real issue. Since Macs are sooo overhyped it is almost impossible to find one for a decent price. I have been through so many different laptops because I don't swear loyalty to any single brand. Whoever has the right hardware at the right cost wins. Point is Macs never have the right cost. They are always overpriced. If I ever found a Mac with the same hardware as a Sony for example at even the same price I might seriously consider giving it a shot.

Does that sound reasonable people?

what you don't like is the fact that Macs are sort of overprice in comparison with other manufacturers. Well, if people want to pay for them, that's they are own problem. In my experience, the machines are very good. Don't criticize the machine if your only issue is price.
I don't swear loyalty to a single brand either but, so far, the Macs are the ones that have produced the least amount of headaches.

 

[alain]

I have not worked in the field, but my dad has for 30 years. When he worked at Chase - they all used Windows. When he worked at Goldman Sachs - they all used Windows. When he was a project manager at B&H, all the programmers used Windows. The list goes on.

windows is very present in all places but that doesn't make it better. It was a cost thing. Windows was very cheap in comparison with the alternatives. In the past it was way cheaper to buy 100 windows boxes are $1000 each instead of 100 Sun boxes at 10K+ or 100 SGI workstations and 6K+. You do the math.

However, if you needed the firepower and could produce the money, you would've bought the powerful machine and leave the winbox behind.

So your dad has worked at all this places, but where in the organization?

 

[rajanS]

I haven't seen anything by lotus in ages...

ok lyosha. it makes sense coming from you since you are a programmer and you are speaking in terms of development which makes sense. But people who only use it for every day ms word or excel can't say that a pc is better than a mac unless they are programmers. And we can also use virtual box and install microsoft in it right? so now it only becomes a hardware issue. Perhaps once I start writing some serious programs and encounter these issues that you had, I might come to the same conclusion as you. But right now, I can't make that conclusion. Also, I believe you said you had these problems couple of years ago. The macbook pro has undergone huge changes. So maybe you might like the macbook pro eventually?

 

[rajanS]

Careful with your wording. Let me clarify:

Things I HATE:
1) What Mr. Obama is doing to our country

5) ...

I would like to stop you right here. you have no idea what obama has done for this country. you are nuts. If it weren't for him, I wouldn't have been able to get an insurance policy that would eventually cover my back problems. I recall when i first injured my back when i was 24, I had 0 coverage since I had no insurance at that time and if i wanted it, I wouldn't have been covered. Because my condition was labeled as preexisting condition. Because of him, I was, the other day, able to call an insurance company and got a quote and was told i would be covered for any preexisting conditions after 6 months once the policy began. This is a huge relief for me as medical treatment for back pain can surge to thousands of dollars. Yea sure the whole newspaper is attacking obama because unemployment rate is again all time high. First of all, you have to understand economics. America has had an history of corporate scandals that eventually brought down this economy. The housing bubble caused the collapse of lehman brothers, AIG, citigroup. American government had to bailout two federal mortgage agencies. Think about what would happen if they didn't? People who had millions of dollars saved in these banks would not have been able to withdraw money the next day, because first, where is the money? 2nd, due to unionization of workers in the north and the fall out of quotas, American car companies couldnt compete with their Japanese counterparts. You have any idea how much Union UAW workers were earning per hour? You can't compete with foreign companies who pay their employees in cents per hour. I dont' want to get into this, because it is time consuming, but there were a host of other factors that went into place that caused hte collapse of this economy. Obama had nothing to do with it.

 

[rishab dhar]

Microsoft does not force you to use a browser made by microsoft. It allows you choice. It also allows you to choose your JVM. It also allows you to choose whether or not your phone can view flash.

It's not microsoft's fault that apple also cannot make a competent browser that opens under windows properly (a.k.a. your counter gripe doesn't work)

So linux is good, windows is okay, mac os X is bad.

I'm happy that you mentioned the above.

The performance of Microsoft's own web browser at best sucks on Windows, for this reason almost everyone is forced to use Chrome/ Frirefox.

The Firefox's performance on Windows machine isn't great either. It takes almost 10 seconds ( in which time some of the Machines can boot!) to open Firefox on my computer. The only saving grace is that once it opens it is relatively fast.

Chrome starts fast, but it can gobble up your RAM very fast, and next thing you know, your PC slows down dramatically. Chrome sucks too. Once you open more than 4 tabs, tt uses more RAM than many of the games out there.

On the contrary, Safari starts on touch on Macs. It also doesn't gobble up RAM like chrome does. For this reason, using safari on either a Mac or a iPhone/iPad is walk in the park (extremely fast and easy).

Linux: Please tell me how many games can you play on Linux? Almost nil. There are serious compatibility issues in such cases. What about support for drivers?

I think I need to pot a link to keep you updated to biggest disadvantages of using Linux.

http://www.brighthub.com/computing/linux/articles/12838.aspx

Plus I have already said that Linux is not a viable choice for most people, as it's UI is not easy.

Windows: People have gotten used to.

Mac: UI is definitely easy.

P.S Should we now accuse Linux for limiting competition?

 

[Eugene Krel]

embrace the power of multiple paragraphs.

 

[rishab dhar]

@ Alexei

What have other manufacturers changed in this time? except for processors/ram (the same you suggested for Apple)

Apple made a transition to Intel back in 2007, and these were the advantages, as per wikipedia.

Advocates of the transition point out the potential for the new Intel Mac systems to run four classes of software at near native speeds: Mac OS X binaries, Java/.NET applications, Unix applications, and Win32/x86 applications.
Originally, emulation software such as DOSBox or Microsoft Virtual PC was required to run x86 software on the Macintosh. Such software could now enjoy much more success with near-native performance through virtualization, such as is currently being done by Parallels Desktop for Mac and VMware Fusion. For those customers wishing to achieve a more conventional environment, a dual, triple, or even quadruple boot solution is possible on an x86 Apple device using Boot Camp software (which includes Windows drivers for Mac hardware).
Although most games depend on the use of DirectX APIs not available on Mac OS X (on either processor type), it should be easier to port OS-independent code, such as OpenGL, now that developers no longer have to resolve endian, and other ISA dependency issues associated with moving from x86 to PowerPC.

 

[Lyosha]

I would like to stop you right here. you have no idea what obama has done for this country. you are nuts. If it weren't for him, I wouldn't have been able to get an insurance policy that would eventually cover my back problems. I recall when i first injured my back when i was 24, I had 0 coverage since I had no insurance at that time and if i wanted it, I wouldn't have been covered. Because my condition was labeled as preexisting condition. Because of him, I was, the other day, able to call an insurance company and got a quote and was told i would be covered for any preexisting conditions after 6 months once the policy began. This is a huge relief for me as medical treatment for back pain can surge to thousands of dollars. Yea sure the whole newspaper is attacking obama because unemployment rate is again all time high. First of all, you have to understand economics. America has had an history of corporate scandals that eventually brought down this economy. The housing bubble caused the collapse of lehman brothers, AIG, citigroup. American government had to bailout two federal mortgage agencies. Think about what would happen if they didn't? People who had millions of dollars saved in these banks would not have been able to withdraw money the next day, because first, where is the money? 2nd, due to unionization of workers in the north and the fall out of quotas, American car companies couldnt compete with their Japanese counterparts. You have any idea how much Union UAW workers were earning per hour? You can't compete with foreign companies who pay their employees in cents per hour. I dont' want to get into this, because it is time consuming, but there were a host of other factors that went into place that caused hte collapse of this economy. Obama had nothing to do with it.

When my father had to get fusion the full price that insurance paid the hospital(s) was $500,000

 

[alain]

Linux: Please tell me how many games can you play on Linux?

After you reach certain age, you tend to stop playing games and you start doing work. I don't think the majority of people who come to this forum care about playing games on the computer anymore.

I think I need to pot a link to keep you updated to biggest disadvantages of using Linux.

http://www.brighthub.com/computing/linux/articles/12838.aspx

That list is for the mom and pop user. Again, I would like to think readers of this forum are what I would call power user. Most (if not all) the items on that list don't apply.

However, I decided to do an experiment once. I bought my wife an HP laptop 5 years ago with Windows. It kept giving me the usual headaches windows+HP combo produces. I switched her to Ubuntu and she was extremely happy. Also, if you are not used to the interface, try Mint.

 

[JasonH]

As far as drivers in Linux, I got my Crossfire'd 5770's working fine in Linux 64-bit and all within 5 minutes.

 

[rishab dhar]

@ alain

I agree with everything that you said. However, as I pointed out, these are the major reasons Linux sucks for pretty much every average computer user.

My point in mentioning all those was that Linux to isn't holy grail, as it is made out to be. When people post the biggest problem with Mac is JVM , which my Windows PC, as it is rarely uses, then the above issues are far more important ones- particularly compatibility of drivers with Linux.

Regarding drivers, I've had serious issues for those, especially on the desktop that I constructed myself. I know of plenty more people who've had such issues.

P.S For 90% computer users on this planet (quants <1%), Mac OS or Windows is the best bet, with Mac catching up very fast (already expected to touch 18-20% of PC shipment in US this quarter). Linux doesn't even come into the picture.

 

[alain]

@ alain

I agree with everything that you said. However, as I pointed out, these are the major reasons Linux sucks for pretty much every average computer user.

In my experience, the average user usually only needs a browser, a word processor and some sort of IM software. That's the reason I can switch them to Linux at anytime.

For 90% computer users on this planet (quants <1%), Mac OS or Windows is the best bet, with Mac catching up very fast (already expected to touch 18-20% of PC shipment in US this quarter). Linux doesn't even come into the picture.

Macs are ridiculously expensive in comparison to PCs (I know, I own 3 macs). 90% of computer users in the world would have a hard time paying for it. If instead of Windows, those PCs came with Linux, the price would go down another $50-$100.

 

[alain]

Linux isn't the "holy grail", windows still is. I'm sorry, but it is the most user friendly operating system for joe average that gets him what he needs. If you deny this, you are in denial.

I wouldn't say Windows is the most user friendly operating system. I would say it is the operating system people are used to. So, it makes it really hard for them to change to something new.

 

[amanda.jayne]

Until I came and found drivers for their printer online somewhere, they used linux to print stuff - it autodetected their printer and installed everything necessary automatically... while windows just couldn't.

On the topic of available Linux printer drivers, have we resolved the Quantlab wireless printing/account authorization while running Linux issue yet?

 

[Huan Dao]

Hence, in this universe, the space of people that should be using OS X is... well, artists, musicians, film editors... those sorts of people.

Guess what? Google banned Window in its company's computers and asked their staffs to use OSX or Linux instead

And the majority of computers used in Facebook office are Macbook pro (I got a friend who worked there told me this)

 

[Lyosha]

So? I knew this already. Its impact has already been "priced" into my words (so to say).

Amanda - there's no native ones that support the user system that we use (this is the problem :-/). But I should be able to get us into the school's general pharos printing system