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338 lines
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<title>Linux compared to other OS's Issue 25</title>
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<H4>
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"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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<center>
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<H2>Linux Compared to Other Operating Systems</H2>
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<H4>By <a href="mailto:elof@image.dk">Kristian Elof Soerensen</a></H4>
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</center>
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<P> <HR>
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<P>You might have the feeling that Linux is a real good OS.
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<P>In this article I will pit some of Linux' features against those of
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some competing *nix's, and thus identify some of Linux's relative strengths
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and weaknesses.
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<P><B>Linux and it's competitors</B>
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<P>Not so long ago a frequent Linux question was "Is it really useful or
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is it just another geeks only OS". Now most insightful people consider
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Linux as being on par with the best, and the interesting question is "when
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is it best to use Linux and when should some other *nix be preferred".
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<P>To help people identify Linux' place in the market, I've made a comparison
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of ten different OS's eight of them *nix's, where each OS's capabilities
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in a number of specific areas, are pitted against each other.
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<P>The comparison is available as an interactive chart at: <A HREF="http://www.falconweb.com/~linuxrx/WS_Linux/OS_comparison.html">http://www.falconweb.com/~linuxrx/WS_Linux/OS_comparison.html
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</A>.
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<P>It's part of a bigger Linux-page called "The Linux Resource Exchange"
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that holds a lot of other Linux-info such as a searchable HOWTO-mirror,
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guides to both unofficial and official patches to the 2.0.* and 2.1.* kernels,
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Linux on workstation hardware pointers, and much more. Take a look at it
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at <A HREF="http://www.falconweb.com/~linuxrx">http://www.falconweb.com/~linuxrx
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</A>.
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<P>It will be noted that the emphasis of the Comparison Chart as well as
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this article is on usability and suitability for "real-world-usage" rather
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than the more technically features of the kernels.
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<P>In this article I will present a summary of the information for Linux
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2.0, Solaris 2.6, SGI Irix 6.2/6.4 and Digital Unix 4.0 and discuss it.
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The web-site has more info, and holds information for BSDI 3.0, Freebsd
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2.2, MacOS 8, OS/2 4, UnixWare 2.1 and OpenServer 5.0 as well. While this
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article is fixed in time, I intent to keep the web-site up-to-date in a
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long time from now.
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<P><B>A small extract of the OS Comparison Chart</B>
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<BR>
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<CENTER><TABLE BORDER=0 CELLSPACING=2 CELLPADDING=3 WIDTH="547" BGCOLOR="#FFFFCC" NOSAVE >
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"><B>Linux 2.0</B></TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"><B>SGI Irix 6.2/6.4</B></TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"><B>SUN Solaris 2.6</B></TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"><B>DIGITAL Unix 4.0</B></TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"><B>OS interoperability</B></TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP NOSAVE>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Runnable foreign binaries</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%" NOSAVE>DOS, Windows 3.1, Macintosh, some SysV</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Dos and Windows 3.1</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Macintosh, Windows 3.1</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Mountable foreign filesystems</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">FAT, VFAT, UFS ro, SysV, HPFS ro, MAC</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">MAC, FAT</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Java</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"><B>OS-standards</B></TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Posix.1</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Designed to comply, but only a hacked version has been
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certified.</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">XPG4 base 95</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">no</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Unix 95</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">no</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">no</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">yes</TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Unix 98</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">no</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">no</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">no</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">no</TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"><B>Policy-issues</B></TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%"> </TD>
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</TR>
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<TR VALIGN=TOP>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Pricing</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Free</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Pay per release</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Pay per release or 2 year subscriptions</TD>
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<TD WIDTH="20%">Pay per release</TD>
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</TR>
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</TABLE></CENTER>
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<DIV ALIGN=right>See the complete chart at <A HREF="http://www.falconweb.com/~linuxrx">http://www.falconweb.com/~linuxrx</A></DIV>
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<P><B>Linux and the OS standards</B>
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<P>The days of the great Unix wars are sort of gone. It has always been
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part of the Unix-philosophy that a program written for Unix should not
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need anything more than a recompile to work on any vendors *nix. In reality
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there have always been many minor and major differences, making the task
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of writing applications runnable on a vide selection of *nix'n a challenging
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one.
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<P>During the 90' the vendors have agreed to write down and follow a set
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of common standards for *nix behavior. The first one to gain big following
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was the Posix.1 standard. In the last couple of years this standard have
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been enchanged by standards such as Unix 95 and Unix98, the newer standards
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including up-to-date versions of the older standards as well as standardizing
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additional areas of Unix. It seems that after a quarter of a century Unix
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can finally live up to the "Unix-box" metaphor, e.g. a generic square box
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with some flavor of *nix capable of running every random Unix-program you
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care to use.
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<P>It's as if OS's are becoming less important from now on. People want
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a box with 100 % standard Unix behavor so they can run all ther applications,
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and buy equipment and OS from whichever vendor has the best offer at the
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day of purchase.
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<P>The versions of *nix made before Linux consisted of many niveaus of
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revorkings of code that stemmed back from the earliest versions. This was
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necessary in order for a *nix version to behave to applications like it's
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counterparts so applications could run everywhere.
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<P>When Linus turned his Linux-development into a quest for a complete
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OS, the Posix.1 standard was his guideline. Having the OS <-> application
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interface ready, allowed him and the other developers to build all the
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internal parts of the OS without using any old code. Ideas fostered and
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experience gained since the original Unix could be freely used in the development
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of Linux, since none of the code from older *nix's had to be used.
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<P>This is one of the main factors that allowed Linux to be so much better
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than the competition. All the innards are brand new modern OS code, taking
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full advantage of modern hardware.
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<P>As can be seen in the chart above, Linux haven't got the official "I
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am Posix.1 compliant" stamp. A German company named <A HREF="http://www.unifix.de">Unifix
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</A>has hacked on Linux and gotten their versions of both 1.2 and 2.0 certified.
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Their work have more or less been included in the main Linux-code. This
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doesn't make Linux Posix.1 certified, but it ensures that it's very close,
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probably as close as it's certified counterparts non-certified patchlevels
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and minor releases.
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<P>It's important that work is done to keep Linux in sync with recent standards,
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or it will turn into a non-standard *nix only suited for certain niche
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purposes, like we are currently seing various BSD derived *nix's do.
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<P><B>Linux does only have a cost of zero if your time is worthless</B>
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<P>The fact that Linux' price tag says zero is not as interesting as it
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might seem.
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<P>Most of the cost of owning and using a computersystem, is the cost of
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time spent on learning how to use the system, time spent on installation
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and maintaining it over it's lifetime, and the initial cost of purchase
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of computer, applications and OS.
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<P>If Linux is a cheap OS then it's because it can do more with less hardware
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than many of it's competitors, or because it comes preinstalled with many
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hundreds of apps., saving installation time, or since it gives it's users
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the ability to work smarter, rather than by the OS itself being obtainable
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without expense
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<P>Linux has better documentation than most OS's, and all of it is on-line,
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so it keeps itself current and is search-able, unlike shelves full of expensive
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vendor supplied paper manuals. The newsgroups and mailing-lists provide
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a rapid help and support forum, that beats every phone-support system I
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have ever used. This ensures more rapid problem fixing than most other
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OS's even when the local gurus are out of luck, and can be used as a learning
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tool, thus helping all Linux users work smarter than people using some
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other *nix.
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<P>Linux can make a PC do most of the tricks an ordinary workstation-user
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makes his workstation do. A workgroup with workstations can be renewed
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to a few high-end workstations as shared CPU servers and a Linux PC on
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every table. This costs less, and the really speedy CPU servers ensures
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that the users gets more power than before.
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<P>What makes Linux an economically OS isn't so much it's own cost of zero,
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but all the related savings and improvements it gives it's users.
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<P><B>Linux speaks many tongues</B>
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<P>One of the first business support purposes Linux was widely put to was
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to act as a multipurpose network device and server. It's capable of handling
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most of the purposes needed to keep a modern LAN or WAN running. It can
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be both router, firewall, bridge, gateway, modem and ISDN dial-up server,
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nameserver and many other network task imaginable. It's also really good
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at server jobs like mail, ftp and web.
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<P>Having the same OS with the same tools doing all these very different
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jobs, instead of having to use a different device for every task, is saving
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people a lot of time, gives more flexibility, and ties up a lot less money
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in equipment purchases or leases.
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<P>Other *nix'n have somewhat similar abilities, but most require expensive
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workstations and really expensive network peripherals, and those that does
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run on PC's doesn't support an equally huge amount of cheap peripherals
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and software as does Linux.
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<!--===================================================================-->
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<P> <hr> <P>
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<center><H5>Copyright © 1998, Kristian Elof Soerensen<BR>
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Published in Issue 25 of <i>Linux Gazette</i>, February 1998</H5></center>
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