The Lagoon TechMy little blog in Cyberspace.

This is a response (Part 1) to the web blog entitled “101 reasons why Linux is better than Windows”(http://cityblogger.com/archives/2007/01/24/101-reasons-why-linux-is-better-than-windows/)”. The author tries to discredit Windows by giving many reasons why Linux is “better”.

I will do my best to show how this is not the case. Operating systems are just tools. If you try to make one OS look “better” than another, you could possibly lead people into the wrong direction. Please note that the author has not written all 101 reasons on his blog. It appears he stopped writing it a while back. I will respond to everything he has currently written.

Direct quotes from the author are in red and my responses are in black.  Please note that I mean no disrespect to the author in anything I say.

Click here for Part 2!

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1) It works  Its not a vaporware and is available today.

Windows is also not vaporware and is most certainly available today as well.

2) Linux doesn’t have the virus problems: Even Microsoft’s CEO Steve Balmer couldn’t clean Windows Viruses. Still not convinced? Read more on Why Linux isn’t affected by Viruses. Its not that there aren’t any viruses for Linux but Linux is more secure and less virus prone.

Actually Linux does have malware. However it is rare to actually get malware on Linux, but the same goes for a properly setup Windows computer too. Just because someone uses Windows does not mean that they will catch malware. If the user is using common sense, in my opinion, 97%+ of all malware will never even touch a Windows machine.

It is extremely rare to catch a virus by just being connected to the Internet (that goes for both Windows and Linux).

3) No Spyware: Not just spyware but none of those funny applications that keep doing things in the background.

This is definitely false. Look here: https://www.fsf.org/blogs/rms/ubuntu-spyware-what-to-do

Even Ubuntu Linux has been accused of having surveillance code in the OS.

4) Linux Doesn’t need defragging: The Linux file systems work very efficiently such that it arranges data in a way that it doesn’t require defragging. to know more, read earlier post.

False. No file system can ever have no fragmentation.

When you delete files (on any file-system, NTFS, ext4, ext3, UFS, FAT32, FAT, ZFS, etc.), you leave gaps in the file-system. These gaps will be filled with other files, but you will also have files before and after the new file. So when the computer goes to access the data, it has to sift though all of the data to find the bits and pieces it needs to complete the task.

5) Linux doesn’t crash without any apparent reasons. In Linux the core operating system (kernel) is separate from the GUl (X-Window) from the applications (OpenOffice.org, etc). So even if the application crashes, the core operating system is not affected. In Windows (Microsoft prefers to call this tight integration) if the Browser crashes, it can take down the entire operating system.

Both the Windows kernel and the Linux kernel are technically separate from the main processes that run (e.g. explorer.exe (on Windows) or the X11 windows system on a Linux distribution).

6) Linux doesn’t crash if you accidentally pulled out your USB key/pen drive. Try this a 100 times if you don’t believe me  but don’t blame me if your pen drive data gets corrupt.

Who pulls in and out their USB stick 100 times anyway? Also, I doubt that will cause Windows to crash.

7) Linux doesn’t require frequent re-installation: In Windows if the OS crashes, there is no easy way to recover this. Many IT support staff don’t know what to do and all they can do is re-install Windows. Which means that users applications and preferences are lost, and needs to be installed again. I haven’t seen anyone using Linux, requiring to re-install unless there is a hard drive failure. Most things in Linux can be fixed without requiring re-installation.

A Windows crash does not mean that someone cannot recover from it. How do you know that it will not be easy to recover a crashed Windows installation?

Just because you have not heard of any Linux users re-installing the Linux OS, does not mean that none have. Ask on a major Linux forum and see what people say.

8) You can keep your operating system from your data, its designed to actually do that very easily. The benefit of this is all the users preferences can be preserved even if the OS needs to be re-installed. This can be handled by creating a separate partition for the home directory, read more.

No one can 100% keep the OS from their data (goes for Windows and Linux). However, you can come very close to accomplishing this on Windows and Linux.

On Windows 7, you can move user profiles (their account data) to another drive (Look here: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/124198-user-profiles-create-move-during-windows-7-installation.html).

9) Linux also doesn’t require rebooting when a new hardware device is added configured.

Unless you have a computer that supports hot-swapable hardware, you would have to shut down your computer to add the new hardware anyway. Configuring new devices on Windows usually do not require restarts anymore.

10) Linux doesn’t require rebooting when you change any setting or re-configure your Network.

The only times I can recall having to reboot Windows from making a network change is when either I  1) changed the work-group the computer is in   and   2) When I add a static IPv6 address to a network device. Not really a big deal.

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Well this is the end of Part 1!  Click here for Part 2!