🚀 go-pugleaf

Angus Creech wrote:
> 
> Robert Hartley (rh@mblab.gla.ac.uk) wrote:
> : > It's quite depressing the way Microsoft runs its business.  Quite often
> : > you can feel yourself being shoe-horned into using their products
> : > because there is simply no alternative; the Internet Explorer Windows
> : > integratrion issue was just the half of it. Office 2000 and
> : > Internet Information Server are prime examples of how business
> : > engineering can corner a market.
> :
> : There are alternatives. You can use WINE for Linux and run MS apps as if
> : you had Windows.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> : Excel is nice though. Probably the best spreadsheet about. Credit where it
> : is due.
> 
> The trouble is, practically everyone in the company, the company's
> clients, and their business partners all use Microsoft Office. Building
> something like a KnowledgeBase (yes, I know it's just a fancy database
> but that's buzzwords for you) involves the ability to search these
> documents etc etc.
> 
> Knowing Office's habit of changing its file formats on a regular basis,
> meant I knew that the final system would have to use (spit) Bill Gates
> software - and low and behold the only thing I could find to do the job
> was Microsoft Internet Information Server.
> 

BBzzzzzzt.. Wrong.  I know you're a programmer Angus.. so I know you
could do any of the following easily:-


Save everything in a SQL server, and access it using Posgres/Perl/Java
Save everything in CSV files and access them using Perl/Java/C/Python
Save everything in CSV, convert them to PerlDb and access them with
Perl.

Apache has modules coming out of it's ass these days.. There's a module
for pretty much anything, and with the beauty of mod_perl and O'Reilly's
"Writing Apache Modules in C and Perl", any person who can do a little
programming can make a built-in Apache module with (relative) ease. 

Microsoft try to make you THINK there's no alternative, and it's SOO
easy to fall into the trap of believeing them.. there is ALWAYS an 
alternative..  As the great Linus Torvalds once said:-

"If the answer is Windows NT, you're asking the wrong Question"

N.


-- 
Nick Walton - 4th year Postgraduate, Edinburgh University, Scotland.  
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