I have been approached by a number of computer-savvy people asking me to put Linux on my computer in place of Microsoft's DOS and Windows operating system. My reply to them has been "Well, have you put it on your computer?" to which query the response has always been "No, but I'm thinking about it." When I question them further as to why their delay, they usually tell me that most of the computers they interact and are compatible with - on the internet and connected into most business and company websites plus e-mail - use DOS or Windows.
Complaints abound against DOS/Windows PC chief Bill Gates for pushing his operating system of DOS (Disk Operating System) and Microsoft's various seamlessly-compatible versions of Windows bullyboy-style on computer hardware and software creators and manufacturers. But I get the impression that behind such criticism is groundless and mindless jealousy and insubordination against authority.
Though not myself an expert in the history of the rise of Gates and Microsoft, I have heard tales about it. Apparently (and I might have some details incorrect) Gates was contracted by IBM to help invent DOS, and Gates saw the value of DOS (though Apple/Mac did not, I think) as the OS to use in not merely mainframe but particularly personal computers. He acquired the legal rights of DOS ownership for his Microsoft company, and computer manufacturers, hardward and software developers, wholesale and retail computer outlets, plus consumers knew a good thing when they saw it.
After investigation, it has become apparent to me that viruses, trojans, and worms can be written against all Apple/Mac OS versions, but rarely occurs because most corporate and individual entities do not have Apple/Mac computers, so the harm which would terroristically be done against a fractional minority is not worth the effort to concoct such damage against them.
Even if Gates and Microsoft had shrewdly "strong-armed" (as the libel goes) [but more-appropriately-put: wisely marketed with] computer-hardware giants IBM, Intel, HP, Dell, japanese, others, through the leverage of licensing which both Gates and Microsoft did, both Apple and Mac have been on the scene sufficiently long enough for the general cyberpublic to have evaluated through trial-and-error experimentation, cumulatively ending up choosing [of their own free will and judgment] to commercially buy into DOS and Windows instead of Apple and Mac.....not merely because of the abundance and majority availability of over-95-occurrent DOS/Windows-specification hardware and software, but because DOS and Windows are (quite frankly) simpler to understand (than Unix and Linux), easier to apply, more convenient (than another needless and therefore useless Unix/Linux OS piggybacked onto DOS and Windows) and more compatible to deal with......enabling the sensibly-minded compliantly-cooperative non-rebel consumer-is-king public at large to be satisfied with and hence utilize effective-enough DOS and Windows PCs with does-the-job efficiency which the computer public has thus financially supported and grown accustomed to.
Back in the 1800s (before my birthed inception) I heard rumors that railroad tracks in different parts of the United States were different widths within different states among different railroad companies. Some were wide and some were narrower. I am not sure whether it was the federal government, mergers of railroad companies, or whoever....but the width of railroad tracks was eventually standardized nationally. The attempt is on by Apple and Mac (but not so much by DOS/Windows Microsoft) to make their newest chips, hardware, and software compatible with Windows to nefariously compete against Microsoft. The general public - however - is reluctant to switch over to Apple and Mac because they fear incompatibility complications against BIOS chips and hardware created by IBM and other computer makers to be compatible ONLY with the DOS and Windows of Microsoft. They also are afraid of the intellectual and educational complexity of adjusting hardware and software to the foreign and possibly-nonseamless OS versions of Apple and Mac computers.....leaving such electronics-engineering intricacies to techie nerds and geeks.
Clearly, a number of Apple/Mac-promoting computer-outlet salespeople are eager to attempt to convince people to buy into Apple and Mac, deceitfully realizing that after encountering the irritating incompatibility difficulties of Apple and Mac, frustrated consumers will resort back to Windows PCs - thus enriching wallets and pocketbooks of the greedy salespeople who conned ignorant consumers into what they should never have conned gullible consumers into.
Dishonest Apple and Mac salespeople accuse Gates of saying that good enterprenuers copy other people's ideas, but great enterprenuers steal them.
Such hypocrisy exists, but God and His saints expose, accept, and reject as both see fit.
Incidently, anti-Microsoft rebels also tout Mozilla Firefox as a supposedly better browser than Internet Explorer. But this webauthor has tried Firefox and found it to build up slower, have poorer-quality .jpg photo-display characteristics, and not able to prompt edit potential-webpage .htm files with Notepad (reminiscent of Netscape browsers).....in stark contrast to most versions of Internet Explorer.
Having said that, the ultimate form of DOS that this author has come to appreciate is version 6.22 as the simplistically best Microsoft ever came up with. The prestine merits of Windows version 3.11 have been expounded upon in another of this author's webpages (i.e. http://win311isbest.jesusanswers.com) but a few things need to be said about the superiority of Windows 95 in contrast to Windows 98SE, Windows 2000, Windows ME, and Windows XP.
First of all, however, lamentable deficiencies of Windows 95 (plus Windows 98SE, Windows 2000, etc.) - compared to Windows 3.11 - are:
1. Confusing/inconvenient longer-than-8-character file and directory names (e.g. Progra~1)
2. Occasional occurrences of (particularly non-erasible Access-Denied) subdirectories within subdirectories within subdirectories within subdirectories within subdirectories
3. Certain larger-than-1.35M files which cannot fit noncompressed onto diskettes
4. Strictly-ordered need-CD-drive-to-load time-consuming registry-centered program load and launch necessity rather than the simpler from-a-few-diskettes load of far less files (of Windows 3.11) into one and only one DOS-created (md then \cd) subdirectory (i.e. "System") onto a DOS-created (md then \cd) Windows directory...all quickly launched after computer reboot.
The advantages of Window 95 are:
a. Capability of having a .bmp file desktop picture as backround to desktop icons
b. Easy Find-New-Hardware Settings/Control-Panel search and setup of monitors, CD-ROM drivers, scanners, sound cards, PCMIA modem cards, etc.
c. Compatibility with Internet Explorer 5.0 and 5.5 (but not IE 6.0) browsers.
Other than being required to load and launch Internet Explorer 6.0 (required for some bank and Yahoo mail websites with 128-bit encryption), the only other significant advantage this webpage author sees of Windows 98SE is a greater number of driver files available for detecting and installing Find-New-Hardware-searched peripherals, because registry-instability of Windows 95 (have you ever lost a crucial .dll file?) can be compensated for by saving a directory of Windows 95 cab files and backing up launched Windows 95 files plus exported (saved) registry into separate backup directories (and I use the term "directories" instead of the Apple/Mac-preferred term "folders").
Apparently, the phenomena of dragging files and directories by mouse into other files and directories came into being in both Windows PC and Apple/Mac computers about the same time, and the bulging moving-the-mouse graphics oddity of Apple/Mac is a rather unimportant quirk to those dependent upon practical business applications.
I have heard that Windows 2000 Professional is a stable operating system, with - again - more driver files available for peripherals, but no other major advantages.
Windows XP has a disadvantagiously non-DOS-based operating system requiring huge hard-disk capacity, an absolute minimum of 64M of RAM memory [basic minumum of 16M of RAM for Windows 98SE].......far beyond the capability of 33M-166M processor-speed 386 and 486 up-to-32M-RAM computers designed for DOS/Windows (NOT designed for ANY Apple/Mac OS versions). If one wants to get into 802g wireless and DSL/broadband high-speed internet and graphical-environment displays, XP of necessity goes with the territory.