Channel 9 Forums - Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Shining Arcanine — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 05:26:46 GMT

I have been playing with my university's Unix server lately and I think Unix has a lot of potential as an operating system, but it is so prohibitively expensive that very few people are running it.

Given that Unix is such an important operating system historically and even today and that SCO is not worth much after its Linux lawsuit, why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO and make Unix more affordable by lowering prices?

Failing to buy SCO would give Google the opportunity to accquire Unix. Google has already been working on its own operating system (Android) and it will undoubtly try to expand its OS development into personal computing. Accquiring Unix would give Google a major jump start in OS development as by accquiring Unix, Google would be getting perhaps the most stable, best written and most reliable OS in the world. Building a GUI on top of it and bundling applications like Firefox and offline versions of Google's spreadsheet and word processor tools could enable Google to target Microsoft's core Windows and Office businesses, like Microsoft targeted Netscape's core business of selling web server software with IIS. With the halo effect that a Google OS would have with younger people, people would begin to start switching to it, eroding Microsoft's marketshare, similarly to what is happening with Apple's Mac OS X with younger people today. Heck, I have not counted, but roughly 10% of the computers run by my university are made by Apple and run Mac OS X because my peers want to use Apple's computers. Imagine that happening with a much more influential company like Google without the OS being locked to any particular OEM, sort of like Google's Android OS on mobile phones is beginning to do now (all of the telecommunications companies are working on making their phones use it), despite not even being out yet.

Perhaps I am going a bit far, but I would really like the ability to buy a copy of Unix for my home PC for $15.75 at my university's store like I can with Windows Vista Ultimate, so I tried to make the best case I could for why Microsoft should buy SCO.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

JonathonW — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 05:55:02 GMT

Probably because proprietary Unix is dying, being replaced with Linux and Windows Server machines. Proprietary Unix is not a good investment right now: Linux and Windows Server have become strong enough competitors that people are moving away from those legacy systems.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

rjdohnert — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 06:03:09 GMT

Not really dying, OpenSolaris is actually creating quite a vibrant community, FreeBSD and Mac OS X also have quite strong followings.

CannotResolveSymbol wrote:

Probably because proprietary Unix is dying, being replaced with Linux and Windows Server machines. Proprietary Unix is not a good investment right now: Linux and Windows Server have become strong enough competitors that people are moving away from those legacy systems.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

TimP — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 07:04:58 GMT

Shining Arcanine wrote:

Perhaps I am going a bit far, but I would really like the ability to buy a copy of Unix for my home PC for $15.75 at my university's store like I can with Windows Vista Ultimate, so I tried to make the best case I could for why Microsoft should buy SCO.

http://www.ubuntu.com/
http://www.freebsd.org/
http://www.openbsd.org/
http://www.sun.com/software/solaris/

Besides, I think that Novell vs. SCO lawsuit determined that SCO never "owned" Unix and that all Unix-related assets belong to Novell.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

JonathonW — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 07:06:40 GMT

rjdohnert wrote:

Not really dying, OpenSolaris is actually creating quite a vibrant community, FreeBSD and Mac OS X also have quite strong followings.

CannotResolveSymbol wrote:
Probably because proprietary Unix is dying, being replaced with Linux and Windows Server machines. Proprietary Unix is not a good investment right now: Linux and Windows Server have become strong enough competitors that people are moving away from those legacy systems.

But proprietary Unixes (OpenSolaris, FreeBSD, and Darwin are all open source) are dying out. SCO Unix is a proprietary, closed system.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

RoyalSchrubber — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 07:15:04 GMT

Shining Arcanine wrote:

but it is so prohibitively expensive that very few people are running it.

Well aside from human resources you can easily find implementations of unix that will cost you nothing (most common examples are BSD and linux). Besides - what is unix other than posix and few standard apps put together. Posix is something nearly all alternative operating systems support - they all suck posix application juice. If you don't have IIS you need posix to run apache/lighttpd/whatever - not unix.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

TimP — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 07:24:29 GMT

To follow up, try typing uname -a on your department Unix machine to identify the kernel. While it may look like Unix, I would be genuinely surprised if it was SCO Unix, since I've never heard of any universities running it this decade.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

evildictaitor — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 07:37:12 GMT

Because SCO lost in SCO vs. Novell and has filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy and lost control over their source-code.

SCO is a really, really bad investment for anybody at this time because its expensive and has remarkably few actual assets.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

martin_lovick — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 10:08:33 GMT

TimP wrote:

Shining Arcanine wrote:
Perhaps I am going a bit far, but I would really like the ability to buy a copy of Unix for my home PC for $15.75 at my university's store like I can with Windows Vista Ultimate, so I tried to make the best case I could for why Microsoft should buy SCO.

http://www.ubuntu.com/
http://www.freebsd.org/
http://www.openbsd.org/
http://www.sun.com/software/solaris/

Besides, I think that Novell vs. SCO lawsuit determined that SCO never "owned" Unix and that all Unix-related assets belong to Novell.

Theres also Ancient Unix @
http://v6.cuzuco.com/ , http://www.lemis.com/grog/Documentation/Lions/
& http://www.tuhs.org/
If you are interested in learning about the development and history of Unix. It also has a number of distributions that you can download for free although they wont work directly on a pc, it might be interesting to try porting

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Shining Arcanine — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 13:53:02 GMT

TimP wrote:

Shining Arcanine wrote:
Perhaps I am going a bit far, but I would really like the ability to buy a copy of Unix for my home PC for $15.75 at my university's store like I can with Windows Vista Ultimate, so I tried to make the best case I could for why Microsoft should buy SCO.

http://www.ubuntu.com/
http://www.freebsd.org/
http://www.openbsd.org/
http://www.sun.com/software/solaris/

Besides, I think that Novell vs. SCO lawsuit determined that SCO never "owned" Unix and that all Unix-related assets belong to Novell.

I have tried Ubuntu before and it did not play nicely with Microsoft Virtual PC. Is it possible to do a dual-boot between Ubuntu and Windows XP? Also, I thought Ubuntu was Linux based and not Unix based. Can a Unix clone really as good as the real thing?

By the way, since Novell owns Unix and SCO distributes it, why does not Microsoft buy both SCO and Novell, so it can own Unix?

TimP wrote:

To follow up, try typing uname -a on your department Unix machine to identify the kernel. While it may look like Unix, I would be genuinely surprised if it was SCO Unix, since I've never heard of any universities running it this decade.

Here is what it says:

SunOS sparky 5.9 Generic_122300-12 sun4u sparc SUNW,Sun-Fire-V440

I did not think it was SCO Unix, as according to Wikipedia:

Wikipedia wrote:

By decree of The Open Group, the term "UNIX®" refers more to a class of operating systems than to a specific implementation of an operating system; those operating systems which meet The Open Group's Single UNIX Specification should be able to bear the UNIX® 98 or UNIX® 03 trademarks today, after the operating system's vendor pays a fee to The Open Group. Systems licensed to use the UNIX® trademark include AIX, HP-UX, IRIX, Solaris, Tru64 (formerly "Digital UNIX"), A/UX, Mac OS X 10.5 on Intel platforms,^[11] and a part of z/OS.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

William Stacey — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 14:31:40 GMT

Shining Arcanine wrote:

By the way, since Novell owns Unix and SCO distributes it, why does not Microsoft buy both SCO and Novell, so it can own Unix?

Why would they? IIRC they owed part of it already and sold it in 2000 (gave it back). They would never make there money back. Moreover, it gets them no farther down the road with their os. Doesn't IBM offer a student version of AIX?

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Shining Arcanine — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 15:40:19 GMT

staceyw wrote:

Shining Arcanine wrote:

By the way, since Novell owns Unix and SCO distributes it, why does not Microsoft buy both SCO and Novell, so it can own Unix?

Why would they? IIRC they owed part of it already and sold it in 2000 (gave it back). They would never make there money back. Moreover, it gets them no farther down the road with their os. Doesn't IBM offer a student version of AIX?

What if Google was to buy SCO and Novell to get Unix?

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

figuerres — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 16:29:38 GMT

Shining Arcanine wrote:

staceyw wrote:

Shining Arcanine wrote:

By the way, since Novell owns Unix and SCO distributes it, why does not Microsoft buy both SCO and Novell, so it can own Unix?

Why would they? IIRC they owed part of it already and sold it in 2000 (gave it back). They would never make there money back. Moreover, it gets them no farther down the road with their os. Doesn't IBM offer a student version of AIX?

What if Google was to buy SCO and Novell to get Unix?

great, let them have it.

really I think you are missing a few things like:

if MSFT started buying *ANY* compmany that made *ANY* OS then someone somewhere would cry foul and start a legal action.

why? recall the legal past, they would accuse MSFT of trying to lock out other OS's and of tyring to create a monopoly etc....

that alone would stop MSFT from the kind of move you are talking about.

a very very very big risk with a huge cost and for what?

let UNIX and Linux stand as they are. they can rise or fall on thier own merits.

as for cost: as posted Linux is for all intent UNIX with a new name and an open source.

and yes you can dual boot between Linux and Windows.

as for the distros that do not play well with VPC I say thats a bloody mess....

the Linux guys are fools for not making thier distros "just work" with VPC -- having it not work due to some kind of "moral high ground" or whatever only hurts them. makes it harder to try out the OS and intimidates the new user who is not an uber-geek.

MSFT has left VPC with that old s3 video emulation for *WAY* to long.... several folks (me included) tryied to tell MSFT with postings on connect that they need to change that... and they did not seem to want to hear that....

HEY MICROSOFT: next version of VPC should allow the user to select from a small list of video card emulations, like say S3, one or two ATI cards and one or two NVIDIA cards.
perhaps an API for adding other video emulations also ??
and more support for USB ports!

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Xaero_Vincent — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 17:53:36 GMT

Linux does work with VirtualPC.

You just have change the X video mode to 16-bit color because the VPC emulated graphics card doesn't like true color (can be done from GUI or by editing xorg.conf) and add "-- i8042.noloop" to end of the kernel boot parameter in menu.lst to get the mouse pointer to work.

Those steps above should take all of thirty seconds.

Still... why VirtualPC?

Unlike VirtualPC, there are several of other virtualization products that all have been optimized for a varity of Linux guests.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Xaero_Vincent — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 18:00:11 GMT

Open source Unix isn't going anywhere. BSD, Darwin, OpenSolaris, and Linux are strong despite laughable marketshare.

The proprietary Unix cousins are done, though. MacOS X is a hybrid proprietary and open source Unix OS.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

figuerres — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 04:21:29 GMT

Xaero_Vincent wrote:

Linux does work with VirtualPC.

You just have change the X video mode to 16-bit color because the VPC emulated graphics card doesn't like true color (can be done from GUI or by editing xorg.conf) and add "-- i8042.noloop" to end of the kernel boot parameter in menu.lst to get the mouse pointer to work.

Those steps above should take all of thirty seconds.

Still... why VirtualPC?

Unlike VirtualPC, there are several of other virtualization products that all have been optimized for a varity of Linux guests.

my comment was not that "it does not work" but rather that both groups (MSFT, Linux OS) have created a bad user experience that IMHO is just plain wrong.

and *IF* they wanted to I bet some of the Linux distro folks could make a bit of code to deal with the problem so that a new user would not have to edit files and go looking for how to fix it.

all the "Year of the Linux Desktop" and other grand statements show that the they "just don't get it" in some very simple cases.

and MSFT needs to look at this also, while selling windows seats is msft's main thing having VPC seem to be "unable" to boot linux gives the less educated the impression that MSFT is not able to make a quality product or that perhaps they threw a wrench in the works to halt use of Linux / Unix.

I am not saying that ither camp is doing this... just that both are making them selves look bad to all the folks that they should be trying to sway....

both sides should be working to give the user a good experience.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Shining Arcanine — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 05:15:51 GMT

Xaero_Vincent wrote:

Linux does work with VirtualPC.

You just have change the X video mode to 16-bit color because the VPC emulated graphics card doesn't like true color (can be done from GUI or by editing xorg.conf) and add "-- i8042.noloop" to end of the kernel boot parameter in menu.lst to get the mouse pointer to work.

Those steps above should take all of thirty seconds.

Still... why VirtualPC?

Unlike VirtualPC, there are several of other virtualization products that all have been optimized for a varity of Linux guests.

The cursor in Ubuntu 7.04 does not work in Virtual PC. Ubuntu 6.10 does not have that problem. It has the 24-bit color issue, but that can easily be worked around. The mouse problem in 7.04 cannot be worked around.

As for why Virtual PC, it is free, it supports hardware virtualization and it is readily avaliable. I would really like to use a Virtual Machine that has all of that with SMP support as well.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Xaero_Vincent — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 06:14:08 GMT

Shining Arcanine wrote:

The cursor in Ubuntu 7.04 does not work in Virtual PC. Ubuntu 6.10 does not have that problem. It has the 24-bit color issue, but that can easily be worked around. The mouse problem in 7.04 cannot be worked around.

As for why Virtual PC, it is free, it supports hardware virtualization and it is readily avaliable. I would really like to use a Virtual Machine that has all of that with SMP support as well.

According to Wikipedia, Virtual PC 2007 doesn't support SMP and uses regular virtualization. Xen and VMWare support SMP, paravirtualization and/or hardware virtualization (CPU kind). I also read that VMWare supports multi-monitors and experimental Direct3D 8 hardware acceleration.

I personally use Virtualbox and it supports Linux distros just fine with full 24 bit color and a seamless mouse (with guest additons). Virtualbox has a neat RDP server feature, where you can remotely access your virtual machine via terminal services client.

The mouse issue is at least solvable in Ubuntu 7.10 and other distributions using "-- i8042.noloop".

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

DigitalDud — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 18:10:48 GMT

The only good (beyond merely viable) *nix OS on the desktop today is OSX. This being the fact that its the only one not missing fundamental technical features like say, how about an actual I/O model? Plus its the only one that gets the "it just works!" factor to actually work, 99% of the time. OSX is the only *nix OS that is truly user friendly, by a long shot.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Tom Servo — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 19:44:20 GMT

Shining Arcanine wrote:

I have tried Ubuntu before and it did not play nicely with Microsoft Virtual PC. Is it possible to do a dual-boot between Ubuntu and Windows XP? Also, I thought Ubuntu was Linux based and not Unix based. Can a Unix clone really as good as the real thing?

If you want the real thing, go with Solaris. It's SVR4 and XPG4/6, and certified UNIX(tm). It also ships Gnome next to CDE. At least in the Solaris Nevada development builds, which are pretty stable, I might add.

Shining Arcanine wrote:

SunOS sparky 5.9 Generic_122300-12 sun4u sparc SUNW,Sun-Fire-V440

That's Solaris 9 for SPARC processors.

So yeah, if you want to continue with what you're used to, go with Solaris x86. Preferably, you should go with Solaris Nevada, which are the development version and technology testbed for what'll become Solaris 11. Don't be mistaken by "development version", even the bleeding edge Community Edition is pretty stable, but going with the Development Edition gets you the extra assurance.

If you want Gnome 2.20, you need to go with Solaris Express CE snv_75 or wait for Solaris Express DE snv_80. All builds before snv_75 ship with the previous release.

Another idea would be to wait for Project Indiana March release. But that project focuses on giving the Linux people a nice and easy entry in the Solaris world, as such it's bash, GNU userland and things like that. Though these things will be user controlled from within the installer, so you can switch to between GNU, SVR4, POSIX and whatever that other was at install time.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

TimP — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 19:59:33 GMT

DigitalDud wrote:

OSX is the only *nix OS that is truly user friendly, by a long shot.

A/UX is pretty user friendly on my Quadra 650. All the coziness of System 7 with SVR3 UNIX underneath.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

evildictaitor — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 20:23:04 GMT

creditcard wrote:

Yes, Virtual PC is a giant crap. If you go on their website and look up supported guest OSes they don't even mention Linux once.

Have you worked out why they made/bought Virtual PC yet? Surely they didn't just go to all of that effort to then go and release it for free? Here's a hint: All of Microsoft's OSes are supported by VPC.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

AndyC — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 20:59:16 GMT

creditcard wrote:

Oh, and I had 24-bit color on my machine in 1997. Wonder why Virtual PC stuggles with it.

Because 24-bit video modes are a performance nightmare? It's going to be worse still if you're having to emulate it too. The real question is why anyone wants to use a 24-bit display rather than a much more performant 32-bit one anyway.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

AndyC — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 21:17:36 GMT

creditcard wrote:

Somehow I don't think that's the reason, it has more to do with the fact that VPC is a immature product compared to the competition.

You're aware that it predates VMWare, right?

But, regardless of virtualisation or not, it's really, really dumb of Linux to still be defaulting to a display mode that is incredibly slow on most graphics cards (even those of the Win 95 era). That just makes no sense at all.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

magicalclick — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 00:52:03 GMT

If MS bought SCO, I can't imagine how much money they have to put into the law suit. "MS reign of Terror Obtaining SCO". It is the same as why MS only bought 22% of stock when Apple was almost gone for good.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

evildictaitor — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 01:42:57 GMT

creditcard wrote:

evildictaitor wrote:

creditcard wrote:
Yes, Virtual PC is a giant crap. If you go on their website and look up supported guest OSes they don't even mention Linux once.

Have you worked out why they made/bought Virtual PC yet? Here's a hint: All of Microsoft's OSes are supported by VPC.

Well guess what? All of Microsoft's OSes are supported by pretty much all mainstream VMs (VMWare, VirtualBox, Xen) and with even better support then with Virtual PC (OMG 24-bits color!). Even for just virtualization for Microsoft operating systems Virtual PC is a cripple.

VPC was made to allow faster debugging of Windows OSes internally. The fact that it could be extended to other operating systems is more of a side-feature.

And you all thought it was a benevolent exercise in giving you free software.

The reason it doesn't support Linux is because Linux uses a couple of different options that Microsoft OSes don't support, and VPC was custom tailored to running MSOSes for this reason.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

evildictaitor — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 01:44:45 GMT

creditcard wrote:

That's a bunch of patent nonsense. In both Windows and Linux colors are actually 24-bits, 8 for Red, 8 for Blue, and 8 Green. Since most systems process data in 32-bits, The last 8 bits of pixel information are just garbage data (or in image formats, the alpha channel). This is true for both Linux and Windows, just Windows advertises a 32-bit color depth on the Control Panel, which is pretty much a lie.

Talking of patent nonsense, you are aware that most video cards and display adapters don't use sequential RGBX RGBX DWORD format but use 3 channel RRRRRRR .... GGGGG .... BBBBB... format, right?

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Xaero_Vincent — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 03:52:14 GMT

AndyC wrote:

You're aware that it predates VMWare, right?

But, regardless of virtualisation or not, it's really, really dumb of Linux to still be defaulting to a display mode that is incredibly slow on most graphics cards (even those of the Win 95 era). That just makes no sense at all.

It doesn't.

As long as the video card and driver support 32 bit video mode, Xserver supports 24 bit color with the extra byte to align the color channels to 4 byte increments in memory, which is more efficent and therefore faster.

Xserver refers both 24 and 32 bit as 24 bit color depth.

The "xdpyinfo" command provides some information about the color depths supported by Xserver and your video card.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

PaoloM — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 05:30:47 GMT

creditcard wrote:

AndyC said:

creditcard wrote:

Somehow I don't think that's the reason, it has more to do with the fact that VPC is a immature product compared to the competition.

You're aware that it predates VMWare, right?

But, regardless of virtualisation or not, it's really, really dumb of Linux to still be defaulting to a display mode that is incredibly slow on most graphics cards (even those of the Win 95 era). That just makes no sense at all.

That's a bunch of patent nonsense. In both Windows and Linux colors are actually 24-bits, 8 for Red, 8 for Blue, and 8 Green. Since most systems process data in 32-bits, The last 8 bits of pixel information are just garbage data (or in image formats, the alpha channel). This is true for both Linux and Windows, just Windows advertises a 32-bit color depth on the Control Panel, which is pretty much a lie.

No, you are wrong.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

PaoloM — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 05:31:20 GMT

There it goes, Safari barfs again

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

JonathonW — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 05:46:56 GMT

PaoloM wrote:

There it goes, Safari barfs again

Until you figure out the secret trick... I can post from Safari

(hint... debug menu)

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

PaoloM — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 06:02:04 GMT

CannotResolveSymbol wrote:

PaoloM wrote:
There it goes, Safari barfs again

Until you figure out the secret trick... I can post from Safari

(hint... debug menu)

Yeah, I knew about that. I didn't enable it after reinstalling Leopard...

That for some reason, tonight really dislikes my network, as it drops out regularly every 5 minutes.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

AndyC — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 09:31:47 GMT

creditcard wrote:

That's a bunch of patent nonsense. In both Windows and Linux colors are actually 24-bits, 8 for Red, 8 for Blue, and 8 Green. Since most systems process data in 32-bits, The last 8 bits of pixel information are just garbage data (or in image formats, the alpha channel). This is true for both Linux and Windows, just Windows advertises a 32-bit color depth on the Control Panel, which is pretty much a lie.

And Virtual PC supports those 32-bit modes without any difficulty whatsoever. The only one it doesn't support is a genuine 24-bit graphics mode and that's what Linux is trying to use on it.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

evildictaitor — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 10:45:53 GMT

creditcard wrote:

Three major kernel revisions later and the "bug" still hasn't be fixed. I think it's safe to assume that the kernel developers don't consider it to be a bug, or if they do, it's a very very low priority

And that's why Linux doesn't have a big market-share, right there.

If Linux developers started to realise that actually users having a good experience is much more important than silly long-term grudges they might hold, or stop bickering about whether Linux ought to even allow programs not released under the GPL, they might actually get some users.

They should get their act together and put in a single line at the top of their kernel:

if(VPC) then { don't use 24-bit color }

And until they do, normal users who just want their computer to work and who might want to try out that new and fangled "Linux thing" will be absolutely sure to not touch it if it doesn't just work.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

TimP — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 20:59:51 GMT

The problem is that Microsoft does not emulate the S3 Trio properly. The hardware S3 Trio supports 24-bit color, VPC tells Linux it has an S3 Trio, so Linux assumes it has 24-bit support, and you're blaming this problem on Linux? If you don't or can't emulate a video card properly, just make your own. VMware uses their own SVGA adapter that doesn't exist in any hardware form, yet Linux supports it out of the box.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

evildictaitor — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 21:17:57 GMT

TimP wrote:

The problem is that Microsoft does not emulate the S3 Trio properly. The hardware S3 Trio supports 24-bit color, VPC tells Linux it has an S3 Trio, so Linux assumes it has 24-bit support, and you're blaming this problem on Linux? If you don't or can't emulate a video card properly, just make your own. VMware uses their own SVGA adapter that doesn't exist in any hardware form, yet Linux supports it out of the box.

It's clearly VPC who is at fault fundamentally here, but if what creditcard says is correct about the ease with which this could be fixed inside Linux, to not do so because it's "not important", "we don't like Microsoft" or "Linux should be emulating Windows! Not other way roundz!" shows a level of arrogance by the Linux developers in this respect.

If there is a simple solution which would make their user's life much easier and they are not taking it on grounds of petty grudges against Microsoft, then it is unsurprising that many people choose not to turn to Linux.

Coffeehouse - Why doesn't Microsoft buy SCO?

Xaero_Vincent — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 21:28:43 GMT

evildictaitor wrote:

And that's why Linux doesn't have a big market-share, right there.

If Linux developers started to realise that actually users having a good experience is much more important than silly long-term grudges they might hold, or stop bickering about whether Linux ought to even allow programs not released under the GPL, they might actually get some users.

They should get their act together and put in a single line at the top of their kernel:

if(VPC) then { don't use 24-bit color }

And until they do, normal users who just want their computer to work and who might want to try out that new and fangled "Linux thing" will be absolutely sure to not touch it if it doesn't just work.

The only way this would be true is if the Xorg drivers for whatever video card Virtual PC virtualizes only supported up to 24 bit video mode.

That is a possible scenerio but it doesn't mean that Xorg fails to support 32 bits per pixel for other cards and drivers.

> grep -G pixmap /var/log/Xorg.0.log

(==) Depth 24 pixmap format is 32 bpp

> xdpyinfo | grep '32'

bitmap unit, bit order, padding:    32, LSBFirst, 32
    depth 1, bits_per_pixel 1, scanline_pad 32
    depth 4, bits_per_pixel 8, scanline_pad 32
    depth 8, bits_per_pixel 8, scanline_pad 32
    depth 15, bits_per_pixel 16, scanline_pad 32
    depth 16, bits_per_pixel 16, scanline_pad 32
    depth 24, bits_per_pixel 32, scanline_pad 32
    depth 32, bits_per_pixel 32, scanline_pad 32
depths (7):    24, 1, 4, 8, 15, 16, 32
    visual id:    0x32
    depth:    32 planes

> info xorg.conf | grep -B 10 -C 4 "Most hardware"

       Depth depth
              This entry specifies what colour depth the Display subsection is
              to be used for. This entry is usually specified, but it may be
              omitted to create a match-all Display subsection or when wishing
              to match only against the FbBpp parameter. The range of depth
              values that are allowed depends on the driver.   Most drivers
              support 8, 15, 16 and 24. Some also support 1 and/or 4, and
              some may support other values (like 30). Note: depth means the
              number of bits in a pixel that are actually used to determine
              the pixel colour. 32 is not a valid depth value. Most hardware
              that uses 32 bits per pixel only uses 24 of them to hold the
              colour information, which means that the colour depth is 24, not
              32.