Going Closed Source Day 3.

3 October, 2009 at 7:37 am Quintin 12 comments

If you have not done so, start reading from day one here:DAY ONE

Time to take stock

Put things into perspective. It is now Saturday Morning, the beginning of my third day of using only closed-source, proprietary software. I am actually looking forward to today, I have sorted out the DVDrom related lockup issues with Windows7. I spoke to several people and they know people who used the RC and they swear the people they know have had “Absolutely No Problems.” Heck last night at a braai I even spoke to a fellow Linuxer who got the professional edition and swears the Tech Department by the company he works have had no problems whatsoever.

Today is going to be a good day methinks.

GoingClosedSource, Software, Tech, Windows Feelingabitbetteraboutit, Office Enterprise, Win7

Going Closed Source Day 2

2 October, 2009 at 11:15 am Quintin 6 comments

If you missed day one of my trek through closed country read it here: Day One

Right, so day one – getting to grips with Windows, did not go well. Day 2 did not start out good either. I had to go back to Linux in order to do my morning tasks in the office because I AM STILL WITHOUT OFFICE!

GoingClosedSource, Software, Tech, Windows Closed Source, WhatwasIthinking, Win7, Windows 7

Going Closed Source. Day 1.

1 October, 2009 at 7:44 pm Quintin 9 comments

Today I got hold of the release version of Windows 7 Ultimate x64. We are a Microsoft Partner company and we get our hands on these kind of things before the normal populace.

Sitting there with 3.2Gigs worth of Windows Vista Problem Solver in my hands got me thinking.

I need to try it.

But I need to do more than just try it. I am a Linux geek and FLOSS fan, so I haven’t used proprietary software on a large scale for a long time. The odd driver here and there, and the odd piece of software there, but I have lived a FLOSS life for many years now.

Working in an IT environment means that I deal with proprietary software on a daily basis.

And here I am, two-and-a-bit hours into a world I never thought I would have ventured into again.

GoingClosedSource, Software, Tech, Windows Closed Source, Software, Win7, Windows 7

Why NO Operating System is Safe. Not. One.

16 July, 2009 at 7:13 pm Quintin 5 comments

About a week ago I had the unmitigated pleasure of heading out to a client to do a routine harddrive swop for their backups to be transferred offsite. This is a weekly thing that gets done to keep their data safe.

As I walked in the door the owner of the company (a financial planning business) asked me to check why they had run through their local bandwidth so quickly.

What I found both horrified and amused me.

How To, OLPC, Offtopic, Tech, Ubuntu, Windows Linux, MacOS, Ubuntu, Virus, Windows

Blast From The Past – Windows 95!

16 May, 2009 at 10:01 pm Quintin 2 comments

A while back I did a quick install and tour of Windows 98, today it was the turn of Windows 95. Playing around with it I can see why so many companies where I did tech support used it in favour of Win98. continue reading…

Software, Windows Blast From The Past, Win95, Windows

Blast From The Past: Windows98!

30 April, 2009 at 7:48 pm Quintin 2 comments

Fooling around with installing Jaunty on my laptop (twice, since the first time I managed to wipe my old /home by installing / on it – genius…) got me in the mood for tinkering.

Today while sitting in the company bakkie stuck in traffice I discovered an old CD holder, and lo and behold in it I discovered, among other things, Windows 98, 98SE, ME and 2000PRO!

I could not wait to get home and fire up a Win98 VM to relive my early tech days… continue reading…

Reviews, Software, Windows 98 vs Vista, Vista, Win98

Lie #324 – Linux Costs more than Windows to Run.

15 January, 2009 at 4:36 pm Quintin 2 comments

Recently we quoted one of our larger customers to upgrade 25 of their workstations to Windows Vista and Office 2007.

After wading through the confusing Microsoft licencing options such as “Software Assurance” and “Volume Licencing” among other details we finally arrived at a quoteable price for the client. I was astounded, to say the least.

Linux, Software, Windows Linux, Microsoft Licence Agreements, Ubuntu, Windows

Today I Installed Antivirus on my Linux Laptop – Here’s Why You Should Too.

14 November, 2008 at 1:44 pm Quintin 3 comments

According to Kaspersky Labs – I am vulnerable. They claim that Linux, BSD and MacOS boxes are open for attack via malicious code.

And I got paranoid.

Linux, Software, Windows Linux Antivirus, Linux Virus Infection

Why Windows is not a good server OS.

31 October, 2008 at 4:02 pm Quintin 9 comments

My Good Friend Jaco Kroon remarked that my blog was becoming a rant – and since then I have refrained from blogging because I deal with Windows on a daily basis. Hence everytime I open my wordpress admin page a rant is in the making.

Hence, today I will refrain from ranting (I hope) and relate clearly why I think Windows is not a good server OS. continue reading…

Software, Windows Windows Server

It’s MY Data! – When Microsoft locks in your property with theirs.

19 August, 2008 at 6:05 am Quintin 1 comment

I have a pet peeve – compatibility. I hate when a computer user cannot work together with others in a workgroup because his/her hardware or software is incompatible with the others.

Now this is one of the first questions people ask me whenever Linux pops into the conversation: “Does it work with WIndows? Is it compatible? Can you open documents sent by Windows users?”

Yes, yes and yes. There is however a flipside – when Windows computers do not work together with Windows computers.

Linux, Software, Windows none

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