I could not agree more. But, being the OS with the biggest market share out there, I think it is inevitable that they would be targeted as such. Then again, though, I would be inclined to state that if Linux were more prevalent, that the open source community would do their best to keep the numbers of exploits and vulns at bay. At least, that would be my hope.

I’d have to agree…even though OpenOffice is free, and has gotten better, I think it in no way compares to MS Office.

As far as MS marketshare, I just don’t see it changing anytime soon. Major corporations will continue to use Windows on the desktop for quite some time, until there is a strong reason to switch. I think I have seen some reasons to switch - my main system at home is running Ubuntu, but I do have multiple machines running Windows in order to support customers abroad - since some applications plain and simply don’t run on *nix, unless you have a VM with XP or something - which I do as well. I do know of one place which was making an attempt to move to RH in the workplace, but don’t know how that transition turned out, or even if it did. Problem there is having to train users - but this could be minimal depending on what you require them to do (could easily be accomplished if you just need them to login, and then use some terminal emulation program to connect to some server).

I think that Microsoft should concentrate on applications. Microsoft Office is the best office suite of applications there is. (okay, except Access. The person that came up with Access should be shot.)

I mean it. MS Office comes first. Then there’s a whole lot of nothing and after that comes the competition in no particular order.

Sure, OpenOffice is okay. Works pefectly, but let’s face it. You can only use OOo if the entire organization moves to OOo. If you’re the only one in the organization that uses OOo, you’ll always be stuck with some inconsistancies that aren’t fatal, but _very_ anoying to say the least. Page-formatting, bullited lists, tables in documents.. OOo just isn’t there yet.

If Microsoft would switch all it’s energy towards applications and make them available for other platforms s well, I’m sure it would make much more money than it does now.

As -goodpeople- already mentions, eventhough MS claims the last version to be ‘completely’ rewritten, they are more likely code evolutions of Windows 2000 (which itself stemms from NT). The reoccurance of a old bug (see it as a fossile hunt is a sure sign of code re-use. The same goes for Office, the code evol’s and the constant additions of ‘future’ have made it bloated and ridden with possibilities. Office has become the defacto standard just because of it’s large user base, when you want to use OO doc’s you still get a funny look cast your way (forget about presentations, powerpoint is all people seem to know, apart from the occasional Apple user)

-net2004eng- has a point, because of the bad code and other problem, MS provides quite a number of professionals with a job so I will not be complaining too much. This also hold true for the many opensource initiatives, the also provide a large group of people with a daily profession. More people are shifting towards opensource based software and this will mean more questions to be answered, so in the long run we only seem to benefit. MS’es marketshare indeed is sickening, but we put them there and can surely put them back where they belong. Only problem is the horde of users who are quite pleased with the, every once in a while not so willing to work, mainstream OS from MS.

Do you mean OpenOffice? OpenOffice can be used in Windows as well…

I don’t see anything changing with MS being at the top, anytime soon… the market share they currently hold is sickening, and looking at it in a positive light, it provides many people with a job! If it worked perfectly all the time, there would be no need for support staff. There are many positives to be gleaned due to their marketshare!

Quit the OS game and devote itself to applications.

Let’s cut the crap. Microsoft isn’t good at OS-development. Never were, never will be. Windows sucks and it always will. Microsft should devote itself to appliocations completeley. Let’s face it. Office is the best Office suite in the world.
I know plenty of people that would happily pay for a native Linux version of MS Office.

Having alternatives and also seeing companies like Dell starting to ship machines that have Ubuntu installed help bring more of the open source software and OSs into the mainstream for home users. Many of the Open Source OSs are getting very user friendly, and this will help them in being competitive with Microsoft…but I think overall, it will be quite some time before we see Microsoft usurped from the top!

I don’t want to start an all out Microsoft Bashing thread but I have to admit that I’m tempted.

My point is this: M$ claims with every Windows version that it was completely rewritten. I simply don’t believe it. After all, we see alot of bugs resurfacing in newer versions of the Windows OS. It is obvious that Microsoft blatantly lies to it’s users.

On the other hand, if it actually is true, then Microsoft employs some very incompetent programmers that manage to make the same mistakes over and over again.

But either way, by claiming that the software is rewritten from scratch, Microsoft admits that their code is crap and that it is cheaper to replace the entitre OS than it is to patch the damn thing.
If I then take into account that you can’t really trust and/or use any Microsoft OS until SP2 is out, I can only be very glad that there are alternatives…

Don’t take this as a defense to MS, because that is totally not the case! Nor does it make MS any more relieved of their duty - just because they are the number one desktop OS out there. They should be putting forth better effort on their part to more securely program their OS and other programs, and maybe this would be assisted by a longer software life cycle development process? A change would be nice, but given their pattern, I don’t see this changing anytime soon either!