What is your main OS besides the Amiga OSes and why?

[Linde]

Certified for what?

Certified for being UNIX? UNIX certification is a thing in itself for starters.

Have you seen the number of exploits in unix systems?

Please point to them and convince me that you are also aware of exploits available for other systems and are making a fair comparison.

When exploitable OpenSSL and bash behavior was found recently, I could upgrade these software components within 24 hours of the open disclosures of their discovery to have them fixed. Had the same thing happened in Windows, I'd probably be waiting for the behavior to be exploited in the wild before the issue was even addressed, and Windows software has had its fair share of security holes. The only reason these exploits make the news is because of full disclosure, that UNIX-like systems make up a large part of the internet infrastructure, and the relative infrequency of such issues on UNIX-likes.

[Thorham]

Actually, people were buying Apple x86 laptops because they were fed up with all the issues and viruses on Windows

I always wondered how people actually get their Win machines so full of crud, mallware and slow downs. I've been using WinXP for years, and have only ever had one virus that I know of because of some illegal game (which I later bought). I don't use virus checkers, no other anti mall ware, no nothing. I have plenty of software installed, too, and no real slowdown (and I don't have a beast peecee).

Really. If people used their brains, their Win machines would stay nice. I used an old Pentium 3 peecee some two and a half years ago before buying my current low end machine. Never any issues (also plenty of software installed), except for that one time virus mentioned above.

Of course, to be on the safe side, I don't do online banking on my peecee. You never know if there is some crap running without those virus checkers. Inconvenient, yes, but nothing a linux distro on an old peecee wont fix.

[AmigaNG]

Unfortunately Windows 8.1 is my main machine, simple because of certain work requirements and gaming, however since odyssey arrived on OS4 and it can play Youtube and Google Doc and is a lot more stable its nice that I can more and more find that my computing needs can be fulfilled by Amiga. Just wish it was a bit quicker at certain tasks.



Linux I kinda try to make the move but agian just some certain little areas in support of both gaming and work have provented me from waving good bye to the big MS, I hope there will be a day when I can.

[Blinx123]

Unfortunately Windows 8.1 is my main machine, simple because of certain work requirements and gaming, however since odyssey arrived on OS4 and it can play Youtube and Google Doc and is a lot more stable its nice that I can more and more find that my computing needs can be fulfilled by Amiga. Just wish it was a bit quicker at certain tasks.



Linux I kinda try to make the move but agian just some certain little areas in support of both gaming and work have provented me from waving good bye to the big MS , I hope there will be a day when I can.

Why not make a list of those things?

I'm sure someone (perhaps even me ) would be willing to work on it.

[buzz]

Gaming on linux has improved significantly over recent years due to Valve/Steam and projects like the Humble Bundle.

You can always run windows in a vm for anything that you can't do on linux - in my case I still need Windows for development on the original Xbox - but for everything else I use linux.

[psxphill]

One literally can't go through the day without reading news on GNU/Linux or one of the BSDs. The same cannot be said about Windows.

Sure, Linux & BSD are attention whores who don't have to worry about being backward compatible with 20 year old LOB apps.
 
 They get an easy ride, which you can go along with. You shouldn't be naïve to think that there is anything inherently better about how they are developed.
 
 You can have it quickly, good or cheap. Pick two.

[Blinx123]

Sure, Linux & BSD are attention whores who don't have to worry about being backward compatible with 20 year old LOB apps.
 
 They get an easy ride, which you can go along with. You shouldn't be naïve to think that there is anything inherently better about how they are developed.

Lol. BS.

1. GNU/Linux, BSD and the likes are no less compatible with old software than Windows. In fact, they are actually more compatible in some areas, since they don't have to rely on deprecated subsystem

(re)implementations and the likes. POSIX software is, in most cases, rather easy to "upgrade". Old Windows software might miss certain irreplacable DDLs or depend on pre-NT kernel functionality that isn't part of the MS Dos subsystem. It's also worth noting that 16 bit software won't run on a modern 64 bit OS (not without emulation), so 20+ year old software might not run at all.

2. GNU/Linux and BSD are both developed by a multinational team of volunteers as well as big corporations. So of course the way they're built is more efficient and generally more productive than the way Windows is implemented. There's much more user and developer input between releases and due to the sheer amount of new developers joining every year, stuff simply gets done much faster.  

It's plain, unadulterated Capitalism (not Communism, as Stalinist Microsoft once claimed).

You can have it quickly, good or cheap. Pick two.

With pleasure. Picking quick and good, since I don't exactly consider my *nix related work cheap.

[guest11527]

Well, try to run a five year old Linux binary on a today's machine and have fun. Ok, I should be more precise: On a GNU/Linux system because the kernel API is usually more stable (mostly, but not always), but library interfaces seem to change on a daily basis.

However, one should also be fair and understand how programs on Linux are used and developed. Windows lives from binary distribution, Linux lives from source code distribution and its volunteers. On linux, you have to recompile, and you have to depend on the community to port from one release to another. Linux runs usually with the programs you get from your distribution, and only if you're lucky from those compiled for something else.

Still, it is a lot of work, and Linux would have a larger user base (but a smaller author and maintainer basis) if the API would be more stable and binary programs could be just used and installed "right away", even from outside the distribution.

Linux makes its programmers happy. Windows makes its vendors happy. Either you beome a programmer and pick Linux and keep maintaining it, or you become a user, pick Windows and keep paying for it.