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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.carno.net.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!munnari.OZ.AU!news.ecn.uoknor.edu!news.wildstar.net!newsfeed.direct.ca!nntp.portal.ca!news.bc.net!info.ucla.edu!csulb.edu!news.sgi.com!hunter.premier.net!news.uoregon.edu!Symiserver2.symantec.com!news From: tedm@agora.rdrop.com Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc Subject: Re: Win 95 and FreeBSD Networking Date: 4 Jan 1997 20:40:57 GMT Organization: Symantec Corp. Lines: 40 Message-ID: <5amf8p$7qv@Symiserver2.symantec.com> References: <sehari.851845795@eng3.iastate.edu> <5a7vkn$peu@Symiserver2.symantec.com> <32ce60d6.0@finesse.isdn.uni-konstanz.de> Reply-To: tedm@agora.rdrop.com NNTP-Posting-Host: shiva2.central.com X-Newsreader: IBM NewsReader/2 v1.2.5 Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc:33618 In <32ce60d6.0@finesse.isdn.uni-konstanz.de>, Pascal.Gienger@uni-konstanz.de (Pascal Gienger) writes: >tedm@agora.rdrop.com wrote: > >: Microsoft will probably include NFS in Windows NT version 6, they are >: currently >: working on the RCP code for NT, this will ship with NT 5 if they can get the >: code done in time. (this directly from one of the NT product managers) The >: current rcp code in NT is not very good. It is highly unlikely that NFS >: will ever >: appear from Microsoft for Win95, so if you want to use Unix to serve files >: you might want to think now about tracking your users into NT as time passes. >: In >: a couple of years when NT has NFS you will be better off. > >That's the typical answer from Microsoft-Fans or -representatives. >Why would they be better off then? What sense would it have to track users >into NT? They don't get NFS for now. PERHAPS they will get then in NT 5. I hear where your coming from, I use OS/2 at home as my primary desktop OS, and FreeBSD to play with. I run Describe, which reads & writes Windword 6.0 files, and Mesa which reads and writes Excel file formats. When you can succeed in getting Microsoft to port Microsoft Office to X-Windows, or someone else writes an office suite that runs under X, is as cheap as Office, and reads the Winword and Excel file formats then there might be a fighting chance in getting Unix on the desktop. However, until that happens, your not going to entice people away from using Microsoft operating systems. The best you can do is at least encourage the Microsofties to use NT, as NT is at least a real multitasking operating system (not a toy like Win95) and if you can get people to at least start multitasking, they are at least going to begin to understand just how awful Win95/Win31/DOS really is. I would at least prefer that Unix be used as much as NT for server operating systems, and critical to doing that is getting NFS support into the most widely used client operating system. We all know that Win95 is too weak an OS for that, and if and when NFS support arrives it will only be with NT. Your going to have a lot more success convincing a die-hard Windows 3.1 fan to switch over to NT than X-Windows, and once they are comfortable with NT it will be easier to get them to switch to X from NT.