oh and look at this:

http://news.netcraft.com

63 % just cant be wrong.

Are you really implying that those servers are really running iis and windows, but are faking it? Thats really really amusing. Thats sort of windows security manegement concept.. security by obscurity.

Response: Not all, but some.And the study you referred to.. you can prove just about anything with surveys and so called studys. Just look at the ppl sponsoring the survey, and you'll see _why_ it was made in the first place. Microsoft has repeatedly try to trashtalk the open source community.. and by the looks of that sentence, this is another attempt. But really.. im not implying apache code dont contain errors, im sure it does.. thats why they continue working on the project.

Response: First of all, its a study. A survey is just a bunch of questions asked to some people. Secondly, you have no idea who funded it - the Apache Foundation might have, and who cares who funds it. The important part is bugs don't lie. They are there, or not - and they are there more frequently for apache.As for the GUI issue.. ill just reply with.. I dont use linux as a workstation.. yet. Mainly because I am dependant on software which is not available on Linux. I do however, use linux as a server. And i surely dont use X, or any more advanced GUI than ncurses. There is no reason to use a GUI on a server, commandline interface to a remote server is all I need.

Response: For the most part, you are right - but you have to think who would need a GUI. The original thread starter, a newbie would benefit from Window's ease of use.I'll tell you one thing *NIX is better than windows at. My firewall is a OpenBSD machine. And Windows sure as hell cannot top that code quality. I'd say Linux is more cost-effective in certain appliances. If you know what you are doing, then you simply cannot beat _free_.

Response: You can beat free all day. If your product is better free is beaten. Thats why we don't run Linux on every PC.And to have access to the source also gives opportunities to alter the OS at your whim.. a thing that is.. IMPOSSIBLE with windows.

Response: You don't need this with Windows. Microsoft provides complete lists of Windows API's and programming information. IF you don't like windows, write a program and make it work differently.And I'll finish off with webserving. Linux does it just as well as windows, and free. Stability you say? Linux is stable. FreeBSD, apparently is even more stable

Response: Although based on Unix, FreeBSD is NOT linux. You need to keep in mind that Uptime is not a good number to look at when we are talking about stabilty. Servers do not run many applications at once (specificly, webservers - which just do webserving). With one Application open - if its coded properly, Windows 2.0 can reach an uptime of years (providing it isn't shut off).

Response: For the most part, I was talking about the needs and requirements that I have when choosing an OS, and I think that was pretty clear in my argumentation.

Also, the topic was using Linux as a server, and not as a workstation, which most of your arguments seems to be based on.

FreeBSD, is as I stated in earlier posts not Linux, but are also released under an Open Source license. It is, however a very nice os, I tend to use OpenBSD, which is a fork that has security as #1 priority.

Uptime is a good number to look at when we are talking stability. Provided the server also meets with the needs the task it has. I'm not that confident win2.0 would have years of uptime and at the same time performing as an FreeBSD webserver.

You know, there is a reason hotmail was run with a backend of FreeBSD and solaris machines. Last I heard the mailservers serving hotmail was run with FreeBSD, with a frontend of win2000 machines.

ONTOPIC: The choice of OS is purely a matter of what you want the server to do, and what skills you are willing to learn (provided you do not have them already). Some things *NIX do better than windows, and vice versa. For me, when I entered the world of *NIX, I got a whole new understanding of OS structure and learned a whole lot. Coming from a windows-world that pretty much shut me out of grasping the concept behind it all, this was a break for me, and I'll never use windows for my own servers again. (Given that I dont need it for special purposes 8) )

Thats my 2 cents, and I'll end my flaming here.

I don't have time for a full reply now, but I will just respond to one of your points that ticked me off the most.

You know, there is a reason hotmail was run with a backend of FreeBSD and solaris machines. Last I heard the mailservers serving hotmail was run with FreeBSD, with a frontend of win2000 machines.

Response: Maybe a few years ago. Since then, Microsoft has fully switched over to a Windows backend. The reason for the old FreeBSD backend was in its place is, in case you don't know your computer history, Microsoft didn't originally create Hotmail, it was purchased. Converting Hotmail over to the newer system wasn't a huge priority - because it worked. When the amount members grew, and Microsoft wanted to impliment .NET features, it was migrated.

Never use the Hotmail excuse when trying to support Nix. It is utterly idiotic, and proves nothing.

I want to take this a step down.

Linux Servers will be around forever, and so will Windows Servers.

People will support their favorite to the death; which has been proven here.

This waste of time / resources just goes to show you how good Windows Servers and Linux Servers really are.

I do have a Gateway desktop with a 120 Gig Harddrive.

This is what we all thought that you had. Before you said 120 gigs of RAM. That's different than a hard drive.

I hope that all of you can forgive me for my mistake.

No need to apologize... we're not bitter here.
And don't hold grudges, ... well, usually don't. LOL ;) ;)

Get Windows 2000, and don't #### around with "many things in the operating system main folder", because you're just going to break it. If you ran Linux and did that, you could be waving bye-bye to your entire HDD, let alone your install of Linux.

I completely agree. If I mess up a setting in Linux, I find that my whole Operating System may not be able to boot, with no way of fixing it. In Windows, each setting is fixable - and a 5 letter string doesn't have the potential of crashing your PC.

Hey there. Glad you found us again. So what do you think of this new redesign? It's amazing that you even recognized it was really us! LOL

In any case, it's weird that those specs won't work on a RedHat 8 or 9 system. To be perfectly honest with ya though, RedHat 7.3 is my absolute favorite.

Linux is by far a more stable platform for servers. its easily customizable and very rarely crashes....very little downtime! A buddy of mine only reboots his Linux server every 6 months...and thats just for the hell of it!

You can even run a Windows network using a Linux server :)\

however, Linux can be tricky to use. If you are not familiar with Linux...i would suggest setting up your Windows Server with RAID to provide fault-tolerance. I personally prefer using Windows Server 2003. its easy to setup...usually takes about a day to install and get a domain up and running. and Active directory is simple to deal with. Maybe you can use a Linux server as a backup domain controller? just have someone set it up for you if you dont know how.

Also...I know for a fact SuSE and Mandrake Linux work on machines as old as 80386s :) ...so a Linux server can be fairly cheap.

One word. APACHE
Yes.. it runs on Windoze also.

are you currently using a hosting service for you site? if so, how much do you know about webservers? you may be in for a headache if you haven't run a webserver before, regardless which os you go with. further, if you know little about linux too, setting up a linux server is probably out of the question, at least for now.

you might find it easy to use apache on windows, but you may need to do some reading to set up virtual servers (ie: 2 or more domains over one ip). i know linux supports unlimited users for free, and can be setup as complex as you wish (you can even be a dial-up ISP for free). i'm not sure how much similar capability would cost using win server, not sure i want to know. i'll forgo further discussion about the costs of linux vs win, or the fact that one of them is notoriously self-centered. you can read about those ideas all over the web and some of the above posts have already wasted much of your time (time you could've spent learning linux:)).

if you want a free and very easy to use backend server that on your dell (or any winbox), 3 words is better than 1: APACHE 2 TRIAD

i have "the triad" controlling my xp home webserver right now. it has been up and stable for 2 wks, lol. but that's not indicating a crash, it's because i'm dual-booted into my new redhat to learn more about fascinating linux.

good luck with whatever you choose!

Thats the funniest thing I've ever heard. How secure do you think a linux newbie could make a computer?

Also, if Linux was more mainstream, there would be a lot more security holes found.

As for Linux being more mainstream, you haven't identified what planet you are posting from, but here where we are, Linux has over half the internet server market, Windoz is in second place ;~).

I think a newbie can make a Linux machine Pretty secure, off the stating line, it's not like you have to do alot.

Windoz is so fraught with hundreds of security holes, because it does not possess a simple sound solid architecture. It also suffers from having literally thousands of ambitious, but not yet highly skilled programmers, futzing with it. Once programmers have a good degree of skill, they become PMs at MS. XP is a many times ressurrected, 9 billion pound, gorilla coded version of MS OS/2 ver 1.0. Just look at the volume of patches you must continually download ... think they are all top notch? Think MS puts their most tallented programmers on patch work? They (patches) have their own (albeit different) holes.

..ajm