Microsoft squeezing virtualization

Lennart Sorensen lsorense-1wCw9BSqJbv44Nm34jS7GywD8/FfD2ys at public.gmane.org
Wed Feb 28 14:43:09 UTC 2007


On Tue, Feb 27, 2007 at 10:02:01PM -0500, phiscock-g851W1bGYuGnS0EtXVNi6w at public.gmane.org wrote:
> Remember that comparison of cars to software? Something like cars would
> get zillions of miles to the gallon if they had made the same advances as
> software.
> 
> Continuing that analogy, if Microsoft made cars, the EULA would specify
> that the car could be repossessed if you used non-Microsoft gasoline in
> it.

Of course you can't compare software and cars.  I can copy the bits in a
software program trivially.  I can't copy a car without a lot of work
and materials.

Software can operate entirely self contained in many cases.  Cars need
input of fuel from outside sources, needs access to roads from other
sources, and needs to get along with other vehicles on those roads, most
of which are from other sources.  Cars also have lots of rules applied
to them that manufacturers and operators must follow, while software can
do whatever it wants.

The concept of comparing them simply makes no sense.

And it is NOT software that has made advancements.  It is computer
hardware.  Now that you can try and compare to cars since it too is a lot
of work to copy.  In many ways software really hasn't advanced at all,
rather the opposite.  It has gotten big, bloated, and inefficient, because
the computer hardware has gotten so good that programmers don't have any
incentive in writing efficient code.  To some extent the internet has
also made it easier to get away with selling bad software since you can
easily distribute patches and updates, where in the past it had better
be right when you shipped it since most users wouldn't be able to get
patches for it if it didn't work right.

--
Len Sorensen
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