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Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register)Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register)Posted Apr 4, 2006 7:35 UTC (Tue) by MortFurd (guest, #9389)In reply to: Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) by Mortaous Parent article: Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register)
Right answer, wrong question.
You've answered "Why virtualization," when the question was "why virtualize Linux ounder Windows?"
The advantages of virtualization are pretty clear.
When you virtualize, though, you want a really solid base. If the underlying system goes down, you lose all of your virtualized servers as well.
Given Windows' tendency to hang, I don't think I'd want it doing the virtualization for a bunch of servers. It's bad enough where I work when just one server goes down. Losing three of four at once sounds like a nightmare.
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Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 4, 2006 8:07 UTC (Tue) by Mortaous (guest, #36933) [Link] Given the comment "Not even vice versa..." I was assuming it was about virtualisation rather than Windows :)
I see little difference between running Windows or Linux as the host OS, I prefer Linux because I understand it and can therefore shutdown all non essential services.
To be fair Windows with no software running is perfectly stable :) Add a virus checker (one that doesnt delete system files) and add your VM software and the system is fine. They key is not to run anything on the host, certainly dont allow any users with in 10 feet of it!
If you want an extra stable environment for VM then use the ESX product, I believe that that provides its own host OS.
Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 5, 2006 1:02 UTC (Wed) by holstein (subscriber, #6122) [Link] >If you want an extra stable environment for VM then use the ESX product, I >believe that that provides its own host OS.
And if I recall correctly, it's "own host OS" is a modified RedHat; at least, that's what I heard from my Windows Sysadmin 'in-law that was so proud to tell me he's now running Linux...
Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 4, 2006 10:05 UTC (Tue) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link] "Given Windows' tendency to hang...."
Not only that, but with Xen the operating system operating in the DomU ring (that is the one having direct hardware access for items like disk formatting and such) has direct and unfettered access to not only the files on the server but to the consoles on the running system.
(for those reading this that don't know yet keep in mind that Xen operates in a similar fasion to the VMware ESX server stuff.. That Xen is the first thing to boot up on your computer and then it loads the domU kernel on top of itself.. which then launches the other VM enviroments)
Obviously if your running a insecure operating system as the domU item then all the operating systems running on the virtual machine are going to share that system's vunerabilities...
That is, say, your running Linux on domU and it has a apache version with a root exploit you could use that root exploit to help you take over a locked down OpenBSD system running in Dom0.
So obviously you want to have the absolutely most stripped down and locked down system imaginable for the domU stuff. Totally disable everything except maybe ssh access.. and even then you have to think very carefully about that. (It may be more smarter to connect the server to a central workstation via serial cable with a different login password then what that workstation may use)
And then given that you can access all the files, network, and such on all the hosted systems from the DomU system then it makes sense to exploit (as a administrator) that and use normally-difficult-to-deploy tools like IDS systems (snort), archive log files, tripwire, anti-virus/rootkit stuff on the domU system.
So obviously given Windows difficult nature with security and 'odd' or unusual configurations and the fact that these sort of security tools are easier to use and generally perform better on Linux shows that Windows is a poor system to deploy virtualised enviroments on compared to stuff like Linux or one of the BSDs.
So I can't realy think of a good reason why on earth one would want to deploy a windows-hosted vm enviroment when you have the options of things like Xen and Vmware.
Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 4, 2006 13:57 UTC (Tue) by jonabbey (subscriber, #2736) [Link] s/domU/dom0/g;
Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 4, 2006 13:56 UTC (Tue) by dw (subscriber, #12017) [Link] "Given Window's tendancy to hang..."
This is no attempt at trolling, or anything else. What you are saying is plain BS. Have you actually used Windows recently? It's been rock solid since around Win2k, and its kernel has quite a few features that Linux may never see.
In the past 2 or 3 years I have had much more trouble keeping Linux systems stable than I have had Microsoft systems. This coming from someone who has run Linux boxes professionally since 2000ish, and Windows boxes since 2001.
The "it's unstable", "it's insecure" mantra is circa mid 90's, would you please for the love of God just drop it. There are much more plausable ways of attacking Microsoft than resorting to outdated lies.
Thanks,
David.
Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 4, 2006 14:21 UTC (Tue) by mikec (guest, #30884) [Link] I cannot speak for servers, other than anecdotal evidence of relatives who can (my servers are all linux), but I can speak to the desktop world as I keep a windows box around for gaming.
I make a point of minimizing the software I install on it (other than games and security updates) and it still finds a way to crash about 1 of 3 times it is booted.
It is a dual boot and its linux counterpart often runs for weeks at a time without issue on the same hardware.
So, trolls or no trolls, windows still has a long way to go before I see bluescreens less often than I see "OOPS" - Not to mention that I can count the number of "OOPS" that required a reboot or stopped work in the last 5 years on my left hand while the same "left hand" metric requires something more like a few weeks on windows. It is _more_ stable than it used to be, but saying its rocky days are over is a bit hasty...
I would offer a hypothesis (maybe someone can prove it already) that Linux now has more "person"-power and hours supporting it than windows does which makes this not surprising (even ignoreing the benifits of open/peer review... )
Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 4, 2006 16:03 UTC (Tue) by mmarq (guest, #2332) [Link] "" The "it's unstable", "it's insecure" mantra is circa mid 90's, would you please for the love of God just drop it. There are much more plausable ways of attacking Microsoft than resorting to outdated lies. ""
Well... you have a pretty solid stand if you count only by your experience.
If been running professional smallserver/workstation Linux from 1999, and moved my personal systems mainly to Linux before 2001, and i've been posting in this forum just about since it opened !
IMHO the "it's unstable", "it's insecure" sticks *pretty good*. Win9x was a complete nightmare, thought not network ready, not really. Win2k improved a lot, and yet more feature rich, it couldn't compare to the 2.4 series and specialy the rock solid 2.2 kernel based distros for small services. WinXP losed some of the stability that Win2k gained, recaptured again by Win2003.
The problem is again compare poorly managed or unmanaged systems with basic managed Linux systems.The stability, security and versality of Linux will win hands down.
The key is in that managed/unmanaged systems relation. Deploy a Win system in a desktop out of the box, cut activeX, VBscript, remove, patch, and or disable insecure features, dont allow email attachment execution, remove or replace WMP with something without net acess, restrict IE to the ~100+ filtered websites relevant to your company, and you have a solid and secure windows environment even if you dont apply active countermeasures.
All this *WORK* will be pretty comparable to a good *UNMANAGED & UNRESTRICTED* Linux distro out of the box, on the same exact hardware.
If you go to servers, unmanaged or poorly unmaged Windows is out of the question, and most probably a poorly managed Linux server could outlast longer then a well managed Windows counterpart.
The conclusion is that you manage your systems pretty well (congratulations), but the not so lucky large majority of systems deployed around the world, in SOHO and small part of SME, are living a true nightmare with the ~7000 malware on the loose.
Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 4, 2006 17:14 UTC (Tue) by dw (subscriber, #12017) [Link] I will accept that the malware is a serious practical problem for users who aren't clued in. For larger setups though, Group Policy and network isolation can effectively prevent the problem of worms like that (for eg., Windows has had Authenticode, or even the simpler "exec only if MD5 is on the allowed list" for many years).
To qualify the statements in my previous post a little more, I was referring mainly to Windows as a desktop. The machine I type this on has not been reinstalled once since it was purchased (Windows XP; 4 years ago), and bar once-yearlyish maintainance (defrag, cleanup temporary files, unused applications), hasn't required much to keep it stable. I believe there have only been one or two occasions where I've had a forced reboot - SP1 and SP2 installation via Windows Update being the obvious culprits.
When I have had the choice I have always used Linux servers, for various reasons. One of the main things, is a Linux system is a hell of a lot more recoverable than a Windows box. Have you ever tried to deal with a corrupt system hive or SAM on a Windows machine? AFAIK you simply can't. :) Compare that to manually reconstructing a lost /etc/passwd with vim.
FWIW, in the past few years, the Windows Media Player installer hasn't permitted you to install until you have chosen your privacy options - it is perfectly possible at this stage of the install to configure it such that it will never connect to the Internet.
Cheers,
David.
Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 4, 2006 17:16 UTC (Tue) by dw (subscriber, #12017) [Link] One last side note on the malware front: Microsoft now has much better infrastructure (in the form of sub UIDs in Vista, and Microsoft Antispyware for XP) in place for dealing with this threat, whereas the likes of OS X and Linux have none. It's another old mantra, but I believe it is still true: Linux is still yet to feel the full force of malware.
Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 4, 2006 18:36 UTC (Tue) by tzafrir (subscriber, #11501) [Link] Windows has a very poor software distribution mechanism to begin with.
A strict white-list of checksums will mean you can't easily deploy tools. Not to mention you can run just about anything without actually executing it (bash, perl, python, ld-linux, you name it).
And then there are "manual" scripts of human engineering.
Microsoft starts supporting, er, Linux (Register) Posted Apr 4, 2006 20:33 UTC (Tue) by mmarq (guest, #2332) [Link] The machine i type my posts on, dont has a glitch since 2001 of virtue of staying out of early betas on it, and only with a rather basic firewall and no virus scan because i patch, or better said, update frequently.
Of course it has "some" management on it, nothing remotely comparable to other WinXP machines i worked on, and it has stayed on for weeks in a row in a "cable" direct connetion to the net without a problem ( a big "worry" in XP), thought usually i do it trough my NAT routed home network... and quite frankly KDE 3.4/5 series is much more joyfull than the XP environment.
The only occasional problem compared to WinXP is hardware device support!
Its nice to have Windows users on this forum, IMO,... its always nice to ear from the other side and or different opinions.
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