Re: Campground WiFi problem

On Sat, 19 Aug 2006 07:51:34 -0700, Thomas Marik wrote:

I do admit to have paid for one of my browsers. I like Safari.

I don't have a problem paying a fair price for competent software. Many
of my Mac buddies use Safari. I've paid for Opera in the past before
Firefox.

I do have a problem over-paying for semi-competent or over-featured dreck.
It always astonishes me how many people sort of accept whatever Microsoft
or some other mass-market company throws at them without questioning
whether there's a less expensive or more functional alternative.

Why pay Symantec for the Norton AV software and pay them a yearly
subscription for updates, when Grisoft free AVG gives virtually the same
flexibility and protection, includes automatic weekly upgrades and does
most of its stuff in the background without interfering with the desktop.

Another current case in point is OpenOffice. Compare its features to MS
Office and you have about 95 percent of the functionality, including 100
percent of the features that I use in my business. Compare the price --
OO is free ($0.00) and MSO is expen$ive (over $400 for the same
functionality) -- and the choice seems clear to me. Plus the fact that I
use a lot of checkboxes in some of my work and OO handles them in a
superior way.

Also software features vary within function groups. I pay for and use the
commercial Agent software when I need to do newsgroup stuff in batches or
in the background or offline. But for straight-up newsgroup browsing, I
use Pan -- a free open source usenet reader that has been ported to the
windoze OS -- simply because it handles text messages in a way that's much
simpler and easier to use than the more complicated Agent interface.

Likewise, I use MapSource for quick and dirty routing because it's fast
and uncomplicated, and you can usually find somebody on eBay willing to
sell it heavily discounted. I use Street Atlas for longer more complex
trips because the database and printing features are usually better, even
if the interface sucks overripe lizard eggs big-time.

For email handling, there are several Linux programs that are equivalent
to or better than anything in the windoze world, but alas, they haven't
been ported over yet. Pegasus is still the best for windoze, although
Mozilla Thunderbird is not bad. Almost anything is superior to MS
Outlook, if only for the security features the others have that Outlook
still lacks for the most part. In my opinion, using MS connectivity
software (IE, Outlook, etc.) is a lot like buying a house with no locks on
the doors.

If more people would shop for software the way they shop for RVs,
Microsoft wouldn't be stealing them blind and the competition would cause
Microsoft to maintain and improve their products. By all reports, the
growing competition from Linux is forcing drastic improvements in Windows
Vista, especially security improvements, and at worst that's a Good Thing.

Linux and the newer Mac OSes have long since deep-sixed Windows
technically as an operating system, and Linux is fast overtaking Windows
and Mac for applications and visual pizazz, which has always been Windows'
principal marketing point. The hot visuals come with Novell's
implementation of Xgl 3D on Suse Linux. Novell has some demo MPGs at
http://www.novell.com/linux/xglrelease/. The spinning cube desktops are
particularly cute.

Regards, John Kinney

.

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