Canonical To Drop Support For Kubuntu

[kraftman]

*sigh* I hate to feed the trolls but I guess I have to bite on this one...

The reason you never saw fragmentation higher than 2% on Linux is because Linux is measuring the fragmentation of individual files only, while Windows looks at the fragmentation of individual files and also the fragmentation of the spread of the files used by the application.

Ok, this needs to be corrected, because you are mistaken. I made a report from Windows XP defrag program:

Entire fragmentation = 28 %
Files fragmentation = 56 %

Too bad for you Linux shows files fragmentation which is higher on Windows than its entire partition fragmentation, so 0,3% Linux vs 56% Windows is completely valid. To give you some picture about the problem:

\Games\Dangerous Waters\Mods\LwAmi_Mod\Graphics\3d.grp

File fragments:
4434

File size:
226 MB

There's many funny things that can be said about Windows security model, too. But maybe next time.

[siban]

Why are you in here if Windows is what you want. I for one am ZERO interested in Microsoft.

The future is Linux, bye.

Are you crazy? What are you talking about?
I didn't say anything about Windows, and I didn't say Linux is bad.
If Linux has ~1% market share, that is a fact, not an opinion.
Now, Linux, the kernel is 20 years old, it has some succeed in embedded computers and in supercomputers. But (GNU/)Linux, as an OS, 1% market share. How can you say it is the future? I don't think you are talking about the kernel.

[kraftman]

Linux doesn't do defragmentation on the fly. If it did, that would be a massive performance loss as every file operation might result in reading and writing lots of data to restructure files on the disk.

Yes, it does, but it's just different mechanism. It doesn't have to copy, paste and delete files to keep very low fragmentation, but it just knows where to put files to keep your space continuous.

I know, and you were wrong.

I couldn't be wrong, because I was basing on my experience. I have 10GB partition for Windows XP, 37GB partition for Linux and 416GB for both (ntfs), so I know how it looks.

ACLs degenerate to Unix permissions if you don't add a lot of special cases, so it's simple enough to get Unix style permissions in Windows. Usually, it's not a problem. But when it comes time for special cases, on Windows it's a cinch, while on Linux you have to enable ACLs and hope system software respects the ACLs. Not a great choice.

It's not only about ability to use Unix permissions on Windows. Same ability won't give you better protection, because it's still Windows security model built from top to bottom. The question is how many Linux users need ACLs?

That's because there are few viruses and trojans that target Linux. It's just not worth trying to target the 0.5% of the PC market that uses Linux. Your analysis is faulty.

Linux marketshare is at least 1.5%. Mac's marketshare is about 6.5%, so we have 8% which is quite high. Previously it was explained to you why Linux marketshare has nearly nothing to viruses (excluding trojans).

What's broken by design about the NT security model? I want specific things, not vague accusations about MS not fixing bugs (which they have) or having a weak security model (which they don't). You also fail to understand how difficult the problem is.

It's ability to run viruses from XP times. It was showed to you they have very weak security model. UAC is simply flawed. You can be sure I understand how it's hard for MS to fix their security problems. I gave you some explanation before where I mentioned the need to keep compatibility is probably the culprit. Remember problems with USB virus or desktop icons? It was damn hard to fix and this just proves it were design flaws. The problem with Windows security is also related to Windows being single user system while Linux being multiuser from the beginning. It's much easier to built something rather then transform.

By design of 9x and before, but not NT. The shell, which is the user interface, had to make some compromises. The system doesn't. The NT security model is not broken by design, at least not any more than the Unix model.

That's maybe in theory:

http://www.windowsecurity.com/whitepapers/NTs_Top_Security_Problems.html

GartnerGroup's conclusion is that Microsoft is not in the security business and responds to security issues only to the degree and manner that fits the company's business model.

There are many points in article, it's worth reading.

But they did go away...Windows *is* more secure than it used to be.

I don't think so. Windows 7 compared to Vista seems to be less secure due to its UAC flaws.

I don't think you understand either security model. Please explain to me what is better about Linux's security model. Once again, I ask you not to be vague. I want specific examples of how the Linux model is better than the Windows model.

It was explained in article you don't want to believe. The hard facts are there are thousands of windows viruses that work, because Windows design flaws and there are just few Linux trojans which doesn't fall into this category.

http://www.researchbooth.com/categor...x_security.php

This article is full of misinformation and oversimplification. Windows has security baked in to the core of the system. Every kernel object, for example, has ACLs associated with it, as do all files and related filesystem objects. On both Linux and Windows, system files belong to a special administrative account, not the user. On both Linux and Windows, programs run as the user unless they elevate (setuid or sudo on Linux and UAC or Run As on Windows). Linux does have the executable bit, which Windows sorely lacks, but everything else is more or less the same. The running of programs is done by the shell on both systems, so it's a shell issue, not a kernel or core OS issue.

Theory and reality shows Windows is insecure by design. It doesn't matter if it has security baked into the core while it's broken.

If you use a non-Admin account, it works fine. MS's only mistake is having the auto-elevate for admin accounts.

Not true. You don't have to use admin account to get virus.

All software has bugs, so when WINE has to reimplement Windows bugs, the same would be just as true making a sort of LINE to run Linux programs on Windows. There are always bugs and special behaviors and if you want to make a clone of an existing system, you have to copy all the buggy behavior too. This is not a Windows problem, this is a reality problem.

That's analogy is completely broken. Are you able to show a single Linux bug that application developers have to 'implement' to make their apps working?

I did: the guy is a zealot and an idiot, much like you.

It seems you're only an idiot here, because you ignore the facts.

Are they fixed in hours? Are they all publicly discussed? No. There are closed mailing lists, there are fixes that languish. There are users who don't update (on either Linux or Windows). Linux has security holes too and they can be exploited. There have been a few examples of cross-platform exploits, in PDFs and web-browsers, for example. Again, most viruses are not targetted at Linux because it's not worth it for the virus writers. If Linux ever became more popular, it would see more viruses and more security holes. It's all there. If you think that Linux has no security holes, then you are an idiot. It's a provable fact about software that there will always be security holes and bugs.

Yep, Linux exploits and security fixes are usually fixed in hours unlike MS which fixes its broken software after months. I never said Linux doesn't had security holes. I said they're usually fixed in hours. Linux and macs are quite popular and there are no windows like viruses.

Just some parts of the shell. A lot of holes have been fixed. MS does fix the holes. But it's an arms race with the virus writers who spend just as much time coming up with new exploits. Remember, MS can't push an update that breaks a bunch of 3rd party software, or results in data loss for the users.

Summing up MS can't fix their damn holes, because they'll brake compatibility! Isn't this what I was talking about?

You are correct, but not for the reasons you think. Mac just doesn't care about compatibility, but it's not used in the enterprise world like Windows is. Macs are mostly used by regular users, people who can afford to buy new versions of software when Apple decides to break the API/ABI every few years. Then again, despite Mac's popularity, it's still got a single-digit market share. Linux has no stable APIs and the developers make a game out of changing the APIs and ABIs on the system all the time. The core OS software is maintained, so long as there are volunteer maintainers around, but as soon as that stops, it doesn't take long before the software ceases to operate on Linux. Microsoft makes guarantees about availability and compatibility and puts a lot of work into it. Linux just doesn't bother, so it can get away without compromising. Not surprisingly, 3rd party software vendors generally won't touch Linux with a ten foot pole. Why bother when the ground is going to be ripped out from under your software with the new API/DE/kernel of the month?

This part begs for longer explanation, but I will just say Linux cares about security and then about compatibility.

[kraftman]

*sigh* I hate to feed the trolls but I guess I have to bite on this one...

And it seems you will break your trolls teeth.

The reason you never saw fragmentation higher than 2% on Linux is because Linux is measuring the fragmentation of individual files only, while Windows looks at the fragmentation of individual files and also the fragmentation of the spread of the files used by the application.

The reason I never saw fragmentation higher on my Linux box are explained here:

389 non-contiguous files (0.3%)
220 non-contiguous directories (0.2%)

(1) http://geekblog.oneandoneis2.org/ind..._defragmenting
(2) http://www.zdnet.co.uk/blogs/the-ope...stem-10024242/
(3) http://sysadmin1138.net/mt/blog/2010...entation.shtml -> (4) http://blogs.technet.com/b/askcore/a...le-growth.aspx

*

"Modern Linux filesystem(s) keep fragmentation at a minimum by keeping all blocks in a file close together, even if they can't be stored in consecutive sectors. Some filesystems, like ext3, effectively allocate the free block that is nearest to other blocks in a file. Therefore it is not necessary to worry about fragmentation in a Linux system."

Say you have an application that reads from the same 10 files consecutively every time it starts up.. On Linux, it will report no fragmentation even if those 10 files are spread all across the platter, while on Windows it will consider the files of the application to be fragmented because they're accessed together but they're spread out on the platter. The files themselves aren't fragmented, but it identifies that the data the applications accesses can be grouped together more optimally.

It's not my problem MS has messed up reporting tool. However, it's not true what you said. The files in Windows are usually terribly fragmented like showed here (4) and this affects performance (3).

The Windows defragger does more than just prevent individual files from being fragmented, it analyzes the most frequently used applications and identifies fragmentation between clusters of related or frequently accessed together files. Also known as "speeding up your most frequently accessed programs". It then defrags them so they can be loaded together without having to have the head bounce all over the platter reading files which individually might not be fragmented but are when you consider the pattern that the files are accessed.

Sadly it's totally broken idea compared to what Linux offers (2 and *). It's not only about individual files (that are terribly fragmented in Windows), but also about entire disk space (1).

Furthermore, it is a core principle of operating system design to make full use of the available hardware. If you take a Linux partition and start filling it above 85% or so, the individual file fragmentation goes through the roof and the performance drops like a rock.. A similar thing happens under Windows partitions. However, the Windows defragger can be used to counter much of the fragmentation of individual files by reshuffling them around a bit and moving the pieces of the files together to prevent major drops in performance. Some Linux filesystems don't have this luxury and the performance just drops like a rock when the filesystem fills up and there's really nothing you can do about it.

You're talking about 85%+ scenarios, but on Windows you have such problems out of the box. There's also defragger for Linux which serves to defragment files in 85%+ scenarios. It's not needed earlier. I would have to check, but current Ext4 probably does very good job even if you're running out of disk space.

In this way, with a defragger, you can hit a much higher utilization of the hard drive 90%+ and still have a decently performing filesystem after running a defragmentation.. While without a defragger, you would have skyrocketing amounts of file fragmentation and a filesystem that slowly screeches to a halt.. Because of this, with an active defragger you can actually use almost all of the storage that you pay for.. While with a Linux filesystem that doesn't have a defragger, you automatically lose a chunk of your filesystem space because using it would cause your filesystem to start to become too fragmented and the performance too slow.

And you said I'm a troll? When you have 90%+ hard drive space used on Windows I can only wish you luck to perform defragmentation. I wonder if entire day will be enough to make it. On Linux your disk will still be much, much less fragmented when you reach 90+ and there's defragger available, so I don't know why are you saying there's not?

[e8hffff]

8%? Are you making a prediction or what?

Why are you in here if Windows is what you want. I for one am ZERO interested in Microsoft.

The future is Linux, bye.

[Sidicas]

It seems you have no clue about the problem. The funny thing is Linux does defragmentation on the fly while Windows does not. That's a fact and the numbers I gave before are facts, too. I've never saw fragmentation higher than 2% in Linux while on Windows it's huge and takes hours to make things looks better.

*sigh* I hate to feed the trolls but I guess I have to bite on this one...

The reason you never saw fragmentation higher than 2% on Linux is because Linux is measuring the fragmentation of individual files only, while Windows looks at the fragmentation of individual files and also the fragmentation of the spread of the files used by the application.

Say you have an application that reads from the same 10 files consecutively every time it starts up.. On Linux, it will report no fragmentation even if those 10 files are spread all across the platter, while on Windows it will consider the files of the application to be fragmented because they're accessed together but they're spread out on the platter. The files themselves aren't fragmented, but it identifies that the data the applications accesses can be grouped together more optimally.

The Windows defragger does more than just prevent individual files from being fragmented, it analyzes the most frequently used applications and identifies fragmentation between clusters of related or frequently accessed together files. Also known as "speeding up your most frequently accessed programs". It then defrags them so they can be loaded together without having to have the head bounce all over the platter reading files which individually might not be fragmented but are when you consider the pattern that the files are accessed.

Furthermore, it is a core principle of operating system design to make full use of the available hardware. If you take a Linux partition and start filling it above 85% or so, the individual file fragmentation goes through the roof and the performance drops like a rock.. A similar thing happens under Windows partitions. However, the Windows defragger can be used to counter much of the fragmentation of individual files by reshuffling them around a bit and moving the pieces of the files together to prevent major drops in performance. Some Linux filesystems don't have this luxury and the performance just drops like a rock when the filesystem fills up and there's really nothing you can do about it.

In this way, with a defragger, you can hit a much higher utilization of the hard drive 90%+ and still have a decently performing filesystem after running a defragmentation.. While without a defragger, you would have skyrocketing amounts of file fragmentation and a filesystem that slowly screeches to a halt.. Because of this, with an active defragger you can actually use almost all of the storage that you pay for.. While with a Linux filesystem that doesn't have a defragger, you automatically lose a chunk of your filesystem space because using it would cause your filesystem to start to become too fragmented and the performance too slow.

So again, for a user trying to get the most out of their hardware. A defragger makes a lot of sense, and always has. The Linux filesystems are not automatically superior just because they "don't need" a defragger. Just because they don't need it, doesn't mean they wouldn't get significant benefits from it especially with disk utilization at 85%+. Linux filesystems would also benefit from a defragger that analyzed applications and grouped the files that are accessed together near each other on the platter, and that benefit would be available regardless of disk utilization.

[siban]

I'm not making a predicition I'm using the market share statistics that I find more legitimate as opposed to website counters, which had Linux being slightly less but approximately equivalent to OS X.

Ok, show me the (reliable) references.

[alcalde]

I'm not making a predicition I'm using the market share statistics that I find more legitimate as opposed to website counters, which had Linux being slightly less but approximately equivalent to OS X.

You find the wish fulfillment statistics more legitimate? Do you meet as many Linux users as OS X users? Believing they're all out there but just not on the net is like believing that dinosaurs aren't extinct, only hiding.

[Luke_Wolf]

8%? Are you making a prediction or what?

It has something like 1-1.5%

http://www.w3counter.com/globalstats.php?year=2011&month=10

http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=8

http://statowl.com/operating_system_market_share.php

I'm not making a predicition I'm using the market share statistics that I find more legitimate as opposed to website counters, which had Linux being slightly less but approximately equivalent to OS X.

[siban]

You're forgetting something very important here, Linux may be 8% or so on the desktop, however Linux dominates embedded and server applications. Linux is a huge target simply because so many businesses are running it for mission critical operations. Now it's true that it's not been worth targetting apple because they've got a tiny user population, but the Linux user base is huge.

8%? Are you making a prediction or what?

It has something like 1-1.5%

http://www.w3counter.com/globalstats.php?year=2011&month=10

http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=8

http://statowl.com/operating_system_market_share.php