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269 lines
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<TITLE>The Answer Guy Issue 31</TITLE>
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<!--endcut ========================================================= -->
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<H4>"Linux Gazette...<I>making Linux just a little more fun!</I>"
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</H4>
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<P> <hr> <P>
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<!-- =============================================================== -->
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<center>
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<H1><A NAME="answer">
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<img src="../gx/dennis/qbubble.gif" alt="(?)" border="0" align="middle">
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<font color="#B03060">The Answer Guy</font>
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<img src="../gx/dennis/bbubble.gif" alt="(!)" border="0" align="middle">
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</A></H1> <BR>
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<H4>By James T. Dennis,
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<a href="mailto:linux-questions-only@ssc.com">linux-questions-only@ssc.com</a><BR>
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Starshine Technical Services,
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<A HREF="http://www.starshine.org/">http://www.starshine.org/</A> </H4>
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</center>
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<p><hr><p>
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<H3>Contents:</H3>
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<p><A HREF="#tag_greeting"><img src="../gx/dennis/bbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0">Greetings From Jim Dennis</a></p>
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<DL>
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<!-- index_text begins -->
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<dt><A HREF="tag_backup.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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></A>Remote Backups (Yet Again)
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--or--
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<dd><A HREF="tag_backup.html"><STRONG>Remote Backups: GNU 'tar' through 'rsh'</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_uidgid.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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></A>Assigning UID/GID
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--or--
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<dd><A HREF="tag_uidgid.html"><STRONG>UID/GID Synchronization and Management</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_uidgid.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>Assigning UID/GID</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_connect.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>How to check your modems connect speed?</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_95slow.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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></A>win95 slowdown
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--or--
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<dd><A HREF="tag_95slow.html"><STRONG>Win '95 Hesitates After Box Has Run Linux?
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</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_95slow.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG> win95 slowdown </STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_badblock.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>Bad Cluster</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_trident.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>XFree86 on Trident Providia 9685</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_sound.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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></A>redhat linux 5.0 and reveal sc400 rev a sound card
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--or--
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<dd><A HREF="tag_sound.html"><STRONG>Reveal SC400 Sound Card: OSS/Linux and OSS/Free Supported?</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_kernel.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>Kernel Overview needed....</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_solprint.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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></A>Printing Solaris -> Linux --or--
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<dd><A HREF="tag_solprint.html"><STRONG>Remote lpd Solaris to Linux</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_idescsi.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>Lilo not working on SCSI when IDE drives installed</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_distrib.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>Yggdrasil: A Breath of Life for the Root of the Linux Distributions?</STRONG></A>
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...and what about OpenLinux Base?
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<dt><A HREF="tag_modem.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>115K Baud from a Modem: In your dreams!</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_NDS.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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></a>Linux NDS --or--
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<dd><A HREF="tag_NDS.html"><STRONG>Linux as a Netware Directory Srvices Printer Client?</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_rpm.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>What is an RPM?</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_guy.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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></A>Stupid question --or--
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<dd><A HREF="tag_guy.html"><STRONG>AnswerGUY? Who is Heather?</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_maildns.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>'<tt>sendmail</tt>' requires DNS ... won't use <tt>/etc/hosts</tt></STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_memleak.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0" ></a>Question on Memory Leak --or--
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<dd><A HREF="tag_memleak.html"><STRONG>Memory Leaks and the OS that Allows Them</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_multihead.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>X Window with two monitors...</STRONG></A>
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<dt><A HREF="tag_cdr.html"><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0"
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><STRONG>DAO software for linux? </STRONG></A>
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<!-- index_text ends -->
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</DL>
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<p><hr width="40%" align="center"></p>
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<h3><A NAME="tag_greeting"><img src="../gx/dennis/bbub.gif" height="28" width="50" alt="(?)" border="0">Greetings From Jim Dennis, August 1998</a></H3>
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<p>By now you've probably heard it a dozen times:</p>
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<p align="center"><a href="http://www.oracle.com/">Oracle</a>
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Announces Intent to Support Linux
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<br><a href="http://www.informix.com/">Informix</a>
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Releases Linux version of their SQL Engine</p>
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<p>... so, what does that mean.</p>
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<p>Well, the good part is that Linux will get more respect from many IT
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departments. It will be easier for sysadmins to recommend Linux,
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FreeBSD, and similar solutions. There also will be a flurry of other
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software companies that will also jump in and port their software to
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this new, upstart Unix implementation. The Informix announcement
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was re-iterated at just about the same time and Inprise (formerly
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Borland) had already made Interbase available awhile back). I expect
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that Lotus Notes and Domino aren't too far behind, and I wouldn't be
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surprised to hear that SAP (publishers of the R/3 ERP system) were
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quietly talking to <a href="http://www.suse.com/">S.u.S.E.</a>
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(I seem to have heard that Adabas is one
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of the supported db engines for SAP R/3, and that has been available
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for Linux for some time).</p>
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<p>There's also an interesting teaser at the Caldera website
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(<a href="http://www.caldera.com/openlinux/index.html"
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>http://www.caldera.com/openlinux/index.html</a>)
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regarding an impending
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"Netware for Linux" --- which should be an interesting server
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platform (Netware's implementation of ACL's, access control lists --
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always seemed better then the others I've seen. So, if you really
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need them on a fileserver, this might be the way to go).</p>
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<p>We've also heard that the server software isn't the only niche that's
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discovering Linux. Regulars of Slashdot
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(<a href="http://www.slashdot.org/"
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<http://www.slashdot.org</a>)
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and the Linux Weekly News (<a href="http://www.lwn.net/"
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>http://www.lwn.net</a>), and any of the major
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Linux newsgroups and mailing lists are also probably aware that
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<a href="http://www.corel.com/">Corel</a>
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has announced projects to port their whole office suite to Linux
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(they've had versions of WordPerfect available for awhile, and one of
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their affiliates,
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Corel Computing
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--- a hardware concern --- is using
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a StrongARM port of Linux which they helped develop as the core of
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their NC --- network computer). Presumably they will also consider
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porting their flagship CorelDraw package, which has been been
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available for some other Unix platforms for some time).</p>
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<blockquote><code>
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<a href=">http://www.corel.com/news/1998/may/linux.htm"
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>http://www.corel.com/news/1998/may/linux.htm</a></code></blockquote>
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<p>Of course it's already joining the fray with Applixware, StarOffice,
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Cliq Suite, Wingz, XessLite, and NeXS, among others.</p>
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<p>So, the commercial software is coming. Linux will take yet another
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step from hobbyist "do-it-yourself" project towards a widespread
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platform for the masses. </p>
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<p>Is there a downside to all of this? Naturally there are some
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risks. While I welcome the availability of Oracle, Informix and
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other major players to the Linux world --- I'd like to remind
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everyone that there are alternatives. See Christopher B. Browne's
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excellent list of these under his website at:</p>
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<blockquote><code><a href="http://www.hex.net/~cbbrowne/"
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>http://www.hex.net/~cbbrowne/</a></code></blockquote>
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<p>... Some of the commercial SQL engines for Linux that I've heard good
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reports about are Solid, JustLogic, and Infoflex. That's not to
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mention the free and shareware packages like PostgreSQL, mSQL, MySQL,
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and Beagle. </p>
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<p>(There are differences in capacity and scalability --- many of these
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are currently limited to table locking rather than being able to
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lock individual records).</p>
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<p>The big risk we now face is that we'll adopt and promote (or
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perpetuate) some application suite or tool with a proprietary set
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of file formats or interfaces. If Microsoft were to ship MS
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Office for Linux tomorrow --- we'd have the same essential problem
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that we have today. When someone sends you a Word .DOC, an Excel
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.XLS or a PowerPoint .PPT you're expected (by an alarming percentage
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of your correspondents) to be able to handle those files. </p>
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<p>Everyone, (freeware and commercial third party vendors alike) is
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has been playing "catch-up" to this tune for far too long. </p>
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<p>This issue of "open document formats" is far more important than
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choice of operating systems. What you run on your machine is
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none of my business. What you send to me in our business transactions
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is. Applix and StarOffice (and the free 'catdoc' and LAOLA filters)
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make a truly valiant effort to deal with some of these proprietary
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formats. They do so with some success (Word 2.0 seems fine, Word
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6.x might be a bit dicey --- Word '97 documents die a horrible death).</p>
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<p>If Microsoft moved quickly they might be able to "take over the
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Linux desktop" by providing "MS Office '98 for Linux." Personally
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I think that would be a shame. I think it would squelch some of the
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interesting work being done on LyX and Cicero, and various other
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"word processor" and desktop publishing interfaces for Linux.</p>
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<p>So, before you rush out to embrace Oracle, and buy one of their
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servers --- take a look at some of the other DBMS packages that
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are out there. Give them a real try (feasibility and capacity
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test) before you commit.</p>
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<p>On another note: I'd like to grant the first "Answer Guy
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Support Award" of the month to Sam Trenholme. He practically
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owns the <a href="news:comp.linux.misc">comp.linux.misc</a>
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newsgroups and answers alot more questions
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there than I get to in a month here. Thanks, Sam. We all owe, ya!</p>
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<p>(I'll try to give these out about once a month --- to someone,
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somewhere, who answers lots of questions in some Linux tech support
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venue).</p>
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<p>One final tidbit: I guess the press isn't getting all mushy on us.
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Either someone at Miller-Freeman's _sysadmin_Magazine_ doesn't
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like Linux or they were typing too fast when they wrote:</p>
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<p>.... Linux is a 2-bit multi-user, multitasking variant
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of the UNIX operating system.
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(p 68, August, 1998; vol. 7 no. 8)</p>
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<p>Can anyone find an extra 30-bits to send them?</p>
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<!--================================================================-->
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<P> <hr> <P>
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<center><H4>Previous "Answer Guy" Columns</H4></center>
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<P>
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<A HREF="../issue13/answer.html">Answer Guy #1, January 1997</A><BR>
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<A HREF="../issue14/answer.html">Answer Guy #2, February 1997</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue15/answer.html">Answer Guy #3, March 1997</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue16/answer.html">Answer Guy #4, April 1997</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue17/answer.html">Answer Guy #5, May 1997</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue18/lg_answer18.html">Answer Guy #6, June 1997</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue19/lg_answer19.html">Answer Guy #7, July 1997</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue20/lg_answer20.html">Answer Guy #8, August 1997</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue21/lg_answer21.html">Answer Guy #9, September 1997</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue22/lg_answer22.html">Answer Guy #10, October 1997</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue23/lg_answer23.html">Answer Guy #11, December 1997</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue24/lg_answer24.html">Answer Guy #12, January 1998</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue25/lg_answer25.html">Answer Guy #13, February 1998</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue26/lg_answer26.html">Answer Guy #14, March 1998</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue27/lg_answer27.html">Answer Guy #15, April 1998</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue28/lg_answer28.html">Answer Guy #16, May 1998</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue29/lg_answer29.html">Answer Guy #17, June 1998</A><br>
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<A HREF="../issue30/lg_answer30.html">Answer Guy #18, July 1998</A>
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<P><HR><P>
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<H5 align="center"><a href="http://www.linuxgazette.com/copying.html"
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>Copyright ©</a> 1998, James T. Dennis <BR>
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Published in <I>Linux Gazette</I> Issue 31 August 1998</H5>
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<P> <hr> <P>
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