Yeah, Yeah

Yawn, the same old misinformation. Don't you just love it when people wheel out 5 year old boilerplate myths.

Windows 7 comes with a firewall and if it weren't for all the antitrust issues they would have included their own antivirus / antispyware too. As it is you can download MS Security essentials which is more than adequate for general purpose use.

Besides, a bog standard (NAT) home router blocks out 99.9% of all attacks almost out of the box. The only thing that really left is trojans and phising which other OSs are equally prone to.

I have a great respect for Linux. In fact if things were different I might have gone that route but it's not the operating system that make Windows what it is, it's the apps and frankly, most Linux apps are second rate. I've spent over 20 years in IT and I've tried a couple of times to move over to Linux but I'm always brought back because a) the Linux apps just don't work as well and b) because I've built up a heck of a lot of knowledge on Windows apps and I'm, not going to ditch all that and start again.

I also think Android is a great smartphone OS and whilst I can imagine owning an Android Tablet to mooch around the house on, but I still can't imagine it on my main desktop at home. It's far too limiting. Chrome by all accounts will be even more restrictive in features and require an internet connection.

I support small businesses running PCs of all sorts (Windows, Macs & Linux) and the number one issue they have is due to internet problems of one sort or another. I would not want to be in a situation where I couldn't even type out a letter, run an accounts package or do some spreadsheet work if the connection suddenly went down.

Chrome may be getting ready for the internet but the internet is certainly not ready for Chrome.

Google are going back to the 'mainframe'. Chrome OS is basically nothing more than a thin client OS. Google has the servers onsite so going the Chrome OS route inhouse makes total sense. I'm just not sure there will be enough flexibility in the system for all the small & medium sized businesses out there.

I'm worried about Chrome OS as a philosophy too. If you take thing to the logical end, this will mean Google will own all your apps and hold all your data. Where does the application developer fit into this? If you were a developer be happy with one outfit controlling what you could or could not distribute?

Lastly, If you thought Microsoft's monopoly was bad, just wait five years and see how bad it's going to get when Google, Apple (and Microsoft) really start locking things down. They all talk of 'standards' but they're all trying to differentiate, through fair means and foul and I believe there's going to be a massive issue of top level fragmentation which is going to hurt businesss and especially small developers. The web is about to be chopped into pieces and Business will end up having to pay three times (or more) to make sure they're connected to everything.

:D

(not one for sticking to a point and much prefers a good ol ramble)

Hardly a big swing IMO

everyone I've seen working for google was using a MBP anyway.

OK in the Googleplex maybe

As far as I'm aware, Chrome OS depends on a fully networked environment, which I have no doubt the Googleplex has in spades. It runs web apps exclusively.

Also, it runs only on very specific hardware - which presumably Google has its desktop estate in this format already, or its a very expensive hardware refresh required.

I'm not saying Chrome OS doesn't have its place, but out here in the real world my ability to store documents on my hardware and available independently of a good enough network connetion and/or cloud is my priority.

Wasn't there a reason we moved away from green screen terminals??

Fail

My shiny new MacBook Air comes with the firewall off _by default_ - a situation not seen in the Windows world since XPSP2.

As for:

"Does anybody dare to connect a fully patched windows install to the internet, without it running

1) a firewall

2) antivirus

3) antispyware"

That's a load of crap, you'd have to deliberately disable the firewall first anyway and I doubt there are that many known unpatched remote execution and elevation exploits out there for this to be possible.

What you are actually doing is quoting ~5 year old anti-MS propaganda where someone would use a pre SP1 disk with no patches half a decade after release and then be all surprised when they got rooted in 5 minutes.

Do try to keep up.

Internet Explorer 8 is tip-top secure?

IE8 is still NOT secure. Try http://crashbrowser.j38.eu/ and leave it for 1 minute. It will crash the browser.

Now, try it on a Chrome browser...

Windows Security

As others have pointed out, it is possible to lock down a Windows machine into a quite secure state. (Using a firewall, using IE8, not running as an Admin for normal use)

The issue is that MS consciously installs the default user as the admin user when running the Windows 7 installation. Probably "normal users can't be bothered with the idea of a normal user versus an Admin user". Apple and Linux don't do this and that means WINDOWS => FAIL.

Also, Linux and BSD have very strong sandbox mechanisms (LSM, chroot(), SE Linux etc) built into the OS. Microsoft has none of that. That means WINDOWS => FAIL.

Sometimes I think MS still lives in the MS-DOS mindset; that is the only way I can explain these things and stuff like ActiveX.

Or, also very nice, their Windows Update Servers. If you are serious about security and would like to lock down your firewall, you have to allow nice URLs like

windowsupdate.c653467.acmecorpNotRelatedToMS.com

windowsupdate.afpusher77.acmecorptRelatedToMS.com

windowsupdate.c653467.microsoft.com

And these URLs change weekly. All part of the Good Windows Update System !

WINDOWS IS A BIG FAT FAIL. Can somebody return Steve B. to the Redmond Zoo ?

Leading Indicators

I did a little googleing and looked at the page number estimator:

"+job posting +gtk +c++" -> about 13.000

"+job posting +qt +c++" -> about 97000

"+job posting +mfc +c++" -> about 62000

"+job posting +wxwidgets +c++" -> about 3200

This seems to indicate that there are quite a few apps in the pipeline which can easily be ported to some non-Windows operating system.

Could happen

"Windows is known for being vulnerable to attacks by hackers and more susceptible to computer viruses than other operating system"

...but there's a crack team of Microsoft developers just waiting to put that right just as soon as Chrome OS gets released!

Fail

Let me get this straight, Google, who's entire backbone is built on linux, its mobile OS and its up and coming desktop OS, all built on linux, everything that is holy to them is built on linux, got hacked by the chineese, and they're blaming it on microsoft.

sounds to me like the people buying in to this googlish spin need be riding on a little yellow bus while wearing a football helmet, because you're fucking retarded...

Fools And Their Opinions

I hate to break it to the supposed security conscious "experts" out there, but you can connect a COMPLETELY UNPATCHED Windows 2000 box to the internet, no firewall, no nothing, forever and have it secure.

As I've always said and will continue to say, the great secret is very simple. Do not leave ports open. Disable by default, use APPLICATIONS that are patched because THAT is where your open port vulnerabilities lie when a box is only running what you needed. Besides, what is the point of leaving code listening on a port if you are going to firewall it away also?

It is the equivalent of saying don't lock the bank vault door, put a guard dog next to a stack of cash in the parking lot.

Remember "Trustworthy Computing"?

And www.trustworthycomputing.com?

That is all.

Google PR spin

Windows is fine, I think the problem lies with Google's geeks - they let them install any OS they like.

Great when your a linux geek, but when the admin or PR noobs install an old version of windows and don't patch it, don't update anything, probably don't install AV, maybe turn off the Firewall (if their crummy version even had it in the first place).

Well, you can see where it goes.

If Google had strict IT governance instead of pandering to their geeks nobody would have been running IE6 in the first place.

Dumping Windows will help, but it's just sticking a plaster over the wound, not a cure.

heh! heh!

"I have done so for over 10 years without being penetrated" - heh! heh!

Paris - because, well, she hasn't.

Sue them...

"LeBlanc grumbled that the assertion of the Financial Times (which wrote the report) that “Windows is known for being vulnerable to attacks by hackers and more susceptible to computer viruses than other operating system” could not be supported by the facts."

Come on Microsoft, if you're so certain the FT are wrong then sue. Then we can all look forwards to finding out who the liars are.

LOL Microsoft - Bahhhh Humbug.

I hate Microsoft with a passion - partly for it's dumbarse management and a complete lack of innovating thinking....

But mostly for it's shit software.......

In a nutshell:

Microsoft gave me all the reasons to ditch them and their products;

And the competition gave me every reason to keep using theirs.....

turn about

Microsoft relied on AS400s for many years after they began bashing IBM's 'dinosaur' systems.

It's easy to play catch up.

"When it comes to security, even hackers admit we’re doing a better job making our products more secure than anyone else. And it’s not just the hackers; third party influentials [sic] and industry leaders like Cisco tell us regularly that our focus and investment continues to surpass others"

It is easy to surpass others when they are already doing it. They can't go back and resecure their browers and software if it is already secure, can they? So Microsoft has all the ground to cover to catch up. So have to invest, have to put their money into making secure what their less than great developers came up with in the first place.

Vista wasn't new????? Come on guys, anyone that developed something new and yet still managed to cram all that XP stuff in is blinkered. It wasn't new or if it was we need to see Redmonds dictionary defiinition of 'New'.

Windows 7 isn't new, it is the crud vista had with yet more glossy stuff and some altered screens. Then thrown in are some linux widgets from Ubuntu and Mandriva to make it look different.

@jlocke

Windows 7 asks you to create users during the install process. It only defaults to the admin account if you choose to skip this step, so if that's the case on your machine it's your own fault. By default windows does have it right on this point.