Surpride Settlement Splits Microsoft

[Druid]

I came across this article and thought that it might be of interest.
Surprise Settlement Splits Microsoft

Druid

[badkarma]

saw that a while back too .... nice sense of humour those guys over at satirewire have  

[gump420]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Macro$haft doesn't actually make software. Shit, even WinXP is just a patched up version of Win2K.

[voidmain]

And Win2k is just a screwed up version of NT.

[iancom]

Careful now... that implies that NT wasn't screwed up!

I was most surprised a few weeks ago when I discovered that one of my NT servers had been up a whole *60 days* without a BSOD/reboot/reinstall SP6a/Security rollup farce.

Of course all of our Linux and FreeBSD servers have run continuously since the last time they needed a hardware or kernel upgrade. One of them has been up well over a year now.

Not to worry though... I am gradually and surreptitiously replacing the existing NT servers with Samba 2.2.3a. Done one already and nobody noticed. I tell a lie... a couple of people asked if I had changed anything since their network drives seemed a little faster..!

It's so difficult convincing manglement that Linux is a better solution than NT/2000. They seem to think that the mere fact that you pay through the nose for it means that it will be a high-quality and well-supported system.

[dbl221]

Dam its like reading an industrial espionage novel...good work.

I think the reason the fucktards in management have that impression about $$ and MicroShit products is that...."you get what you pay for".

Or as I like to say "you pay for what you get"

 

[voidmain]

IanC, I have run Samba in place of NT servers for quite some time.  In fact I have been doing contract work for a company and every time I go over there I install another Linux server for them and have replaced a few of their NT servers.  None of them have been file and print servers mind you.  Now tomorrow they want to set up Linux on a hefty server and eventually want to replace their main file servers.  I told them I would be more than happy to help eradicate but there are several things they must consider.  They are already familiar with the NT way of setting up shares and permissions etc.  I have no problem personally editing the config file with "vi" for creating shares.  My partners are less familiar with *NIX and can set up shares with "swat" and/or "webmin" with little trouble.  I usually set up Samba as type "SERVER" and point to an NT domain controller so you can use NT domain users in the permissions.  I was curious if you knew of other graphical tools that maybe an MCSE or lesser could be comfortable with?

Regarding your "uptime" on your NT server.  You're uptime is only going to be as good as your last service pack.  Damn it's nice to be able to upgrade without having to reboot. I have a few Linux machines with over a year of uptime!

[iancom]

Other than the two you mentioned, I'm afraid I haven't tried any other graphical tools. I refuse to employ MCSE's so anyone here who has any responsibilty for creating / modifying shares etc has the necessary clue and sudo+webmin rights to do so.

It does get a little laborious maintaining a copy of your NT user list on the Samba server as well as the Domain, but the release notes for 2.2.3a assure us that will be sorted very soon...

[Calum]

Imagine that! those poor misguided fools waste their precious time, and cough up their life savings into Bill Gates' chamber pot, just to get an MCSE, and then people like you make a point of refusing to employ them!

Well done!!!

[iancom]

My CV includes the phrase:

"I am not Microsoft Certified and never intend to become so."

The pimps routinely try and edit it out when they send on my CV but I don't let them...

As far as I'm concerned any company that's looking for an MCSE just doesn't really know what they're looking for and I certainly don't want to work for them...

I've signed up for RHCE (exam only) in May... that really looks like a qualification that's worth something.

[voidmain]

Unfortunately the company I do a little contracting for had 0 *NIX until I started doing some work for them. Now they have several Linux boxen.  And they also have 0 *NIX literate people, but I am changing that.  In fact I don't believe any of them are actually MCSEs (I just use that term for anyone who only knows MS OSs).  They are actually better than MCSEs because as an MCSE by default you can't even trouble-shoot your way out of a cardboard box.

[iancom]

Yeah... I've worked with (read tolerated) MCSE's before. They think they know everything when in fact they can't even properly maintain the systems they've been trained for never mind opening up their minds to anything else.

A few years ago I worked through an NT MCSE book. After I had finished it I realised why this is. The MCSE does not prepare you for real-life situations, interoperability and most disturbingly it does not give you any real problem-solving abilities. There are predefined problems to each of which they advocate only one predefined solution. There is no scope for creativity in problem resolution. If you don't do it their way, it's wrong - even if your way works just as well or better. Needless to say I decided not to waste any money on taking the exams.

Wherever possible, I prefer to take people on at a junior level who show real enthusiasm for IT, logical thinking and common sense. Their actual professional computing experience is almost irrelevant as far as I'm concerned...

[voidmain]

I totally agree!  The last company I worked for (about 5 years worth) had several MCSEs.  Guess who they called when they had problems with their MS DNS, WINS, NetBIOS, TCP/IP, NetBEUI, registry, virus, and more problems when they couldn't figure them out?  It was so bad I was spending more time fixing Win* problems even though I was the top *NIX guy at the company, I just plain got burned out on it and gave up hope.

And I don't know how many times I've been asked "Do you have your MCSE?" and I have to answer "no, and the day I need to get one is the day I get out of the computer business".  It makes me sick when HR people think having an MCSE is important.  When I hired people to work for me if I saw MCSE on their resume they went straight to the bottom of the pile.

I'll bet 50% of the MCSEs I've met have never touched a server or any other operating system other than MS Win95/98 and just studied the books and took the tests as their ticket into a server job. Turns out when they get into the real world they do not have a clue, nor are they apt to get a clue even after a year or more of being in the field (most, not all of them). Then, their cert becomes worthless when the next version of Win* comes out and they have to study and take more tests to become certified in the new version.  When do they have time to learn real trouble-shooting and problem resolution?

So in my opinion, the *only* thing that an MCSE certification ensures, is more money for Bill Gates.  It puts them on a one way course to nowhere. And if the MS empire ever *does* fall, they will be flippin' burgers, but hey, the world needs burger flippers too.

[ February 13, 2002: Message edited by: VoidMain ]

[iancom]

The MCSE programme is another one of M$'s Fear, Uncertaintly and Doubt tactics to strengthen their stranglehold on the server market. It's easy to pass (it would have to be having seen some of the muppets who have passed it!) and so there are loads of people out there proudly proclaiming their MCSE status on their CV's.

This leads companies to believe that they will always have access to a large pool of employees that are skilled in maintaining, upgrading and troubleshooting a M$-based infrastructure. This is of course seen as a Good Thing by upper manglement and thus M$ infrastructures are deployed and a policy of hiring MCSE's implemented.

Unfortunately, upper manglement are so far removed from the sharp-end of the IT infrastructure that they really don't understand the consequences of this policy. And the real killer here is...

...because they only employ MCSE's there is no-one capable of properly explaining to manglement why the infrastructure is not performing as well as it should, and no non-M$ solutions are ever considered. The company invests in more servers and M$ products because they assume they have just overloaded them and need to spread the load.

You know what's coming next.

The use of M$ products now has so many companies in the position such that to support their user base they are having to add new servers every year. Implementation and maintenance costs rise. New MSCE staff are hired to look after the spiralling numbers of servers.

Where can they go? What can they do?

".NET" says Microsoft.

"We'll take those server costs and troubles off your hands for you."

"For a fee. And by the way, if you're late paying us we'll sell your data to your competition."

"What the hell, we'll probably do that anyway. Read the EULA"

They are creating problems so that people will buy the otherwise unnecessary solution from them... a solution which will of course have its own problems.... ad infinitum.

[badkarma]

quote:Originally posted by IanC:
Wherever possible, I prefer to take people on at a junior level who show real enthusiasm for IT, logical thinking and common sense. Their actual professional computing experience is almost irrelevant as far as I'm concerned...

Amen    

If I weren't already employed I would have asked you for a job    

21, no degrees (college drop out, long story, don't ask    ), no actual prior professional programming experience but got hired as a (jr) programmer (this may come over a bit cocky but I wouldn't have expected otherwise    ) and have been working there for about 7 months now and am really loving it, and have learned more there in 7 months then in 2 years of college (by far ....)

We have some MCSE books lying around the office but it's still quite the mystery as to why seeing we are a linux only company  

[ February 13, 2002: Message edited by: BadKarma ]