FreeLists / 24hoursupport / [24hoursupport] Re: Win98 SE upgrade

["Ron Allen" <chizotz@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 02 May 2003 12:39:33 -0500
  yyixi001@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>I see an ebay offer for Linux Mandrake 9 for $20, but 
>when I asked them
>if it would run with AdSubtract banner blocker, 
>TextAssist 4,
>MailWasher, and a few other things, they never even 
>bothered to reply.

Linux is not Windows and WILL NOT run Windows programs.

Linux is a UNIX-like operating system, and is totally 
different from Windows in every regard. Mandrake is a name 
for a particular flavor of Linux that features a graphical 
interface similar to Windows, but that is where the 
similarity ends.

Now to be complete in my answer, there is at least one 
program for Linux that emulates Windows and lets you run 
SOME Windows programs under SOME conditions under Linux. 
However, AFAIK they are still far, far, away from being 
able to run ALL Windows programs (even excluding games) 
with anything even approaching 100% reliability. I don't 
count that kind of scenario when I say that "Linux can't 
run Windows programs" because it is so unreliable and 
restrictive as to be meaningless for most people at this 
point.

There is an unfortunate and rather unwarrented and unfair 
snobbery toward Windows by many Linux users. Linux 
definitely has some advantages over Windows, but Windows 
is, by far, easier to use and has the most software 
available for it, so it has some advantages over Linux. 
Which is "better" is more a matter of, among other things, 
taste. However, that is probably why they did not respond, 
they did not see it as worthy of a response.

Interestingly, to me anyway, is the fact that the Mandrake 
graphical interface is basically a shell that opeartes 
over the standard command-line Linux environment. Back in 
the Windows 3.x and 95 days, all of the Linux people 
howled and jeered at Windows because it was a "shell over 
DOS, and not a TRUE operating system". Now we have the 
same basic situation with Mandrake and other Linux 
distributions, but the Linux people aren't making fun of 
that.

HTH,

Ron

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