Re: Linux Myths...

[Patrick Reynolds <reynolds@cs.duke.edu>]

> But what's the use of NT's claim that they support 4GB files when the NTFS
> supports at most 4GB disk partitions?

?!  I've never run into the NTFS partition limit, and I've set up
partitions at least 40 GB on big RAID sets.  _FAT16_ supports 2GB or 4GB
partitions, but FAT32 and NTFS relax that restriction.

In my understanding, NTFS partitions and files can be up to 16 exabytes =
2^64, substantially larger than Linux on x86.

> > (a) Reliability: They cite some of their customers. There are also
> >     a lot of companies which trust in Linux. These should be listed. A
> >     lot of critical web servers run Linux/Apache. But to claim this is
> >     not enough. We need to cite some.
> Name Dell, IBM, HP, Corel.

I don't think any of those run major web servers on Linux.  Dell's web
server is actually one that MS is very proud to have running IIS.  Dell's
web server also returns strange 500-class (server too busy, anyone?)  
errors more frequently than it should...

Major web servers running on Linux are Google, Dejanews, and the British
royal family.  Among others.

> The sole fact that Corel ships a Linux distribution says exactly the same.

This is primarily about which businesses trust Linux for critical
functions, not which businesses sell Linux.

> there are patches for ext2 to add the journalling feature to it? I might be

Patches don't count.  Real businesses do _not_ install experimental
patches on their servers.  When ext3 makes it into a stable kernel and
goes a few months without any bug reports, _then_ you can expect to see
distributions ship it as the default and enterprises start using it.

> calling up M$'s tech support is $US 38. Linux support is free.

US$38 would be surprisingly low for premiuim, per-incident support (ISTR
hearing figures like $125 or $200 per indicent...  And I've found even
that level of support to be sorely lacking.).  But to be fair, commercial
Linux support is just as expensive.  You can get free support on the net
for both OSes, and you can pay loads of money for commercial support for
both OSes.  Linux wins by a nod, if only because its free support is a
little bit better...

> possibly more. I remember trying to configure DNS on NT - took me three days
> to figure out where the config files are (and I got the information from a
> pirate copy of MSDN - shame on me) :)). On Linux it took me 15 minutes!

That's anecdotal.  It's probably representative of a huge number of
administrators (but by no means all adminitrators), but anecdotal evidence
doesn't make great marketing literature.

>   - Linux supports much more file systems and partition types than NT ever
>     will.
>   - Linux can access network resources via NFS, Samba, Coda while the
>     standard NT just Samba
>   - Linux can act as a Novell server, Samba server, NFS server, Coda server
>     all at a time
>   - With a standard Linux distro you get a full set of utilities ranging
>     from basic net support, through printing, development up to games.
>   - Linux has much smaller hardware requirements. A functional Linux router
>     can start off one diskette. Can NT do that?

All true, and good points.  This, if anything, is where any sort of
marketing counter-offensive should begin.  Microsoft chose to highlight
the relatively few things that NT is (arguably) better at: performance on
large, SMP machines, documented security, etc.  We should answer their
claims but probably concentrate on highlighting the many things where
Linux is better -- even if those aren't a direct point-for-point response
to their claims.

--Patrick

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