Viruses: Windows vs. Linux

[GAHD]

:) I still Say PCDOS can do anything you bsolutely need a computer to do.

 

The main things I do to keep windows virus-free:

• Screen your downloads with your logical mind:
  
  • Is it from a reliable source? If not, don't download it.
    
  • CAN it conceivealy contain a virus? By Filetype.
    

  [*]Run a firewall,

  • Windows has it's own software firewall, but it lacks a lot of features one might want, you can turn it off, and turn the damed alerts off too, but it is better than nothing if you're willing to put up with it.
    
  • Nowadays a lot of ISPs are releasing their own Software Firewalls, and a few of them are actually pritty good.
    
  • Decent Freeware options are out there too. For quick-intall average user ZoneAlarm is one easy-to-use software filter. For those who like to custom everything and enjoy stealth settings, try Outpost. Most are for Microsoft systems, due to user base.
    
  • Are there any good Mac Firewalls? I don't know, I was a DOS kid.
    

  [*]Get a decent Virus scanner. Better yet, get two. There are 'trial' ones and there are some freeware ones out there, just refer to the first point on where you get them. Treat your computer like your house: how fortified are you? Would you buy a lockset from a crook?

  [*]When things do go south, reinstall, reinstall, reinstall. It helps if you keep a backup copy of your OS itself in another bootable partition. If you feel lucky you can get windows dual or even triple booting on one partition, though this eats up a LOT of space, it does provide you with tools when the other boot is BSODing every 5 minutes.

[Southtown]

huh? Since when can you not run open source programs on windows????

Whoops, that is a false statement, huh? Sorry, I wasn't thinking straight. Maybe I was trying to invoke the whole M$, Netscape, Sun lawsuits... unfair competition and such...

 

Anyways, retracted.

[alexander]

huh? Since when can you not run open source programs on windows????

well to start off, since microexcrement has been for the longest time, deliberately making their system incompattible with hundreds of thousands of open-source tools, since they fail to standardize any protocol or format they have ever created (i mean read up on how well samba has been keeping up, then try to come back and tell me that mirosoft wants to make stuff compattible) so to the original question, hell yeah you can run open-source programs on windows, but its not the OS that helps it, it is the dedicated hackers who reverse enginner the protocols that do, and by the way, there only maybe 5% of total open-source applications that have ports to windows, so...

[alexander]

South, i think that you should rephrase it to something like

"an OS that allows you to read the license before you buy it, and an OS that encourages and promotes both open and closed source developement and a company that does not spend millions of dollars in an effort to monopolize the market!"

[Southtown]

That reminds me of a documentary I saw of the history of opensource... I can't remember the name. A bunch of computer buyers read the M$Winblows EULA, and picketed M$ to get the refunds promised them for returning the unused disks. They did not receive their refunds. (surprize)

[alexander]

oh, but you can do it, i have a friend that got a refund, you just have to be really, really anal, and you have to have a legit key for the OS, but then its just a matter of several hours for several days with MS people, cuz they dont want to give refunds, and then you get 100 bucks :)

[rockytriton]

the lack of ports to windows doesn't mean that windows is making their OS incompatible with the open source software, it means the linux elitists don't want to port their stuff to windows. By the way, MS was very involved in creating and standardizing the SOAP protocol.

[alexander]

involved, yes, created it, no!

 

and no, lack of porte mean that developers have better things to do then port their stuff to windows, or it just cant run on windows because of what that OS can do, or because the tool is a script and in order to convert it to windows = to write a new tool from scratch, or because the creators can care less, i mean i dont see any windows programs being ported to linux nor any amount of people doing such ports. And that's like what 1 protocol out of like a good couple dozen, nor do they follow it all the way, they still are microsoft, they still dont follow their own standards...!

[rockytriton]

I was involved in testing early implementations of SOAP and I remember that Microsoft was involved with other companies in creating the standard. I just think it would be nice if people like you would focus your anger on something more useful. Maybe saving the environment. Well, on second thought, then you might become one of those crazy eco-terrorists, so nevermind, just keep hating microsoft please! :)

[alexander]

rocky, i understand you, but you have to understand too, you have been brainwashed by an OS that cant even fork an executable or thread, and now you just started to find out about the world of freedom, but in the open-source world, it becomes clear who encourages open-source tool development and who tries as best as they can to kill it (open source) before it gets too big, not realising that the domination overcome is inevitable...

[rockytriton]

Alexander, I've been programming and designing software on many different operating systems for years now, I'm not brainwashed by windows, trust me. And I know about the inner workings of these operating systems.

[alexander]

they didnt create SOAP! they were involved in the standardization of it, because ite everything that they need, the os is all xml based and its a lightweight protocol for xml info exchange. But before you go further, look at the protocols that were created by M$, i mean, look at netbios, chap, mms, hell, look at anything they have tried to standardize, even their own made xml...

[alexander]

that was supposed to be a sorcastic remark and was to be taken as a joke rocky, i know that you know, i read your posts! jeez, lighten up will ya :)

[rockytriton]

I know it's nothing personal. By the way, standardizing soap is creating it, because it's not a specific thing, it's a standard. They created implementations, which many other companies did as well, including the open sourcers. Though I've had to use the apache version before and it was god-awful slow, we ended up modifying the source to cut out stuff we didn't want to use and sped it up 100 times.

[alexander]

Oh and I dont hate M$, i can care less for it, i hate when people try to prove something that they have no idea about, people that try to prove something based on something else, that is entirely different from what they are trying to prove and people that try to prove something that even they themselves know not to be true (as well as many other things on the lists of things i hate, topping all, has got to be stupid people (not people that kind that do stupid things on occasion, the kind that do normal things on occasion)...)

[alexander]

the new apache modules are actually real light weight and awful fast, but yeah i remember when they were still sloooooow as a snail....