mikesmith_oz@relaymail.net writes:
> >NT I had to reboot every week to reclaim memory leaked by NT. Under Linux,
> >the last time I shut it down (to move to a new building) it had been up
> >158 days.
...
> Is Linux really the perfect solution in a GUI world?  I'm aware of

No. Who said it was?

> X-Windows, but does it have the diversity of apps that Windows has?

No. Who said it does? On the other hand, it is remotable. That is, right now
I have windows open on my desktop from 7 different hosts on our network and
as far as I can tell they are all "local".

> Does it *never* have problems when a badly behaved app crashes?  Somehow I

Yes. Obviously, *never* is hyperbole, but I have never observed this in
four years of daily Linux use. If it did occur it would be rightly regarded
as an OS bug. In four years, I have had one hang due to a bad ethernet card
locking the bus. Other than that, I have had no OS level problems.

> doubt this.  The original internet trojan horse took advantage of some holes

The internet worm is famous. Partly because it was a big deal, but largely
because it was unusual. Compare with other systems and other viruses.
By and large there is no such thing as a unix "anti-virus" software even
though the majority of internet hosts run some flavor of unix.

> in unix.  Its unreasonable to expect that all bugs in unix have been fixed -

Of course.

> just like its unreasonable to expect this in NT - a much newer os.  I expect

Unix has had 15 years of field testing and bugfixing. NT hasn't. Is this
supposed to be an NT advantage?

> that when NT reaches the current age of unix, the kind of problems we are
> experiencing will be fixed (and replaced with newer, more subtle ones! <g>)

If the the recent spate of Explorer and ActiveX security bugs is any
indication, the future is now, at least "newer, more subtle" bugwise.


If you would like to discuss this further, please reply privately not to
the list as it really is off topic.

Thanks,

-dg

David Gould            dg@illustra.com           510.628.3783 or 510.305.9468
Informix Software                       300 Lakeside Drive  Oakland, CA 94612
Q: If you could get in the time machine and go back and change one thing
that's happened in the history of computing, what would it be?
A: "I would have written a BASIC interpreter for the first PCs".
                                    -- Bob Metcalfe, inventor of Ethernet