Alternatives to Windows

Microsoft Windows isn't the only operating system for personal computers, or even the best... it's just the best-marketed. Its inconsistent behavior and the interface that changes with every version are the main reasons people find computers difficult to use. Microsoft adds new bells and whistles in each release, and claims that this time they've solved the countless problems in the previous versions... but the hype is never really fulfilled. The upgrade prices are blatant, documented gouging, which serve primarily to keep the cash flowing to Microsoft to subsidize their efforts to take over other markets. And a slew of intrusive new "features" in Windows XP benefit Microsoft at the expensive of both your privacy and your freedom. So rather than switching to WinXP, consider switching to something better. There's an exciting array of interesting operating systems out there, and the overall quality of them is stronger than ever.

If you can't say NO to Windows (which is understandable in many cases), you can still say NO MORE. The simplest alternative to Windows XP is a previously-installed version of Windows. Windows XP isn't a simple upgrade like 98 or ME was; it's actually a different operating system, which has compatibility problems with some pre-XP software, and won't work properly with a lot of older hardware, so installing the XP "upgrade" is a risk. And it'll be slower. Besides, most new software will still work on the earlier versions of Windows. Even if the software box brags "for Windows XP", that's because Microsoft tells developers not to list earlier versions. The bottom line: if you already own Windows 95/98/ME/2K and it works for you, you don't have to upgrade; you can continue using it without paying Microsoft another dime. I've used the latest versions in my job, but I still use ol' Win98 (occasionally) at home.

The Mac OS user interface inspired the creation of Windows, and is still the target Microsoft is trying to equal. As a popular consumer product, there's plenty of software available for it, and in certain professions (like graphic design and education), it's as ubiquitous as Windows is in big business. Now even Windows-focused publications are starting to pay more attention to it, for both home and mainstream business use. (After all, Apple Corp. runs on it.) The current version, OS X (ten), uses Unix technology, which makes it more stable and secure than Windows, and lets you run free Unix software. But the real star is OS X's visual interface, which shows the difference between Microsoft's guesswork in this area and Apple's innovative design work: it's both beautiful and easy to use. The main "negative" to Mac OS is that you need to buy an Apple computer to use it, but that's not much of a sacrifice: in addition to being stylish, they're top-notch in quality, and both faster and less expensive than you'd expect. Apple has a section of their site for people wondering if they can switch to Mac OS. (This site runs on an OS X system when the main server is offline for maintenance.)

Linux (LIH-nux) is a free Unix-like operating system, developed by programmers who who simply love the challenge of solving problems and producing quality software... even if that means giving the resulting product away. Not coincidentally, there's also a wealth of free software for it (which is also true of most other free operating systems). Unlike commercial operating systems, which are usually controlled in every detail by a single company, Linux has a standard consistent core (called the "kernel") around which many varieties (known as "distributions") have been produced by various companies and organisations. Some are aimed at geeks, some focus on the needs of business users, and some are designed with home users in mind. You can test-drive Linux with Knoppix, a version of Linux that runs from a CD. New Linux users should start with one of the mainstream distributions, such as Mandrake, Xandros, Lycoris, SUSE, or Lindows. Power users might prefer Debian, Slackware, or Gentoo. Linux is a first-rate choice for servers; the main server of this site is a Linux system.

BeOS was designed with multimedia in mind, including the kinds of features that Microsoft is just now tacking onto Windows. Although Microsoft successfully drove Be Corp. out of business through illegal interference with their business efforts, reports of BeOS's death are exaggerated: The source code for BeOS has been licensed to European software firm YellowTAB whose Zeta is effectively the much-longed-for BeOS R6. The free BeOS R5 Personal Edition is still available to download, and has been patched to support newer hardware as BeOS Max Edition. And OpenBeOS and a few other projects are creating open-source duplicates of BeOS R5, which will then be enhanced.

FreeBSD is commonly called "the free Unix". It's descended from the classic 1970's Berkeley Software Distribution of Unix (from before the OS became "UNIX"®), making it one of the most mature and stable operating systems around. It's "free" as in "free beer" (you can download it for nothing) and as in "free speech" (you can do pretty much whatever you like with it... like when Microsoft took code from it to add better networking to Windows NT). Unlike the plethora of Linuxes, there's only one current version of FreeBSD, with a consistent structure and an easy-to-use "ports" system for installing software. It can also run most Linux binaries. Much of the Internet infrastructure was built on FreeBSD, due to its combination of quality and cost. It's always been excellent for servers, but it's become comparable to mainstream Linux distros as a desktop OS as well. Its main platform is the Intel x86 architecture, with ports to a few others.

OpenBSD is "the other free Unix". It's similar to FreeBSD both in the Berkeley code it's based on, and the licensing terms. One key advantage it has over its BSD siblings (and nearly any other OS) is that it's incredibly secure from attack, as implied by its blowfish mascot, and made explicit by their boast of only one remotely-exploitable hole - ever - in their default installation. (Compare that to Windows' hundreds.) "Open" is a reference to their code auditing process, not a welcome-mat for crackers. It's not as speedy as FreeBSD, but it's safer. It's also available for some hardware plaforms FreeBSD doesn't support, including Mac 68K, PPC, Amiga, Sun, Vax, and others.

NetBSD is "the other other free Unix". It's the work of another group of volunteer developers using the net to collaborate (hence the name of their product). Their mission is to get the OS to run - and run well - on hardware platforms no other Unix supports. In addition to most of the usual suspects above, it's been ported to run on the NeXT box, MIPS machines, the good Atari computers, the BeBox, WinCE-compatible handhelds, ARM processors, and even game machines like the Playstation 2 or the orphaned Sega Dreamcast. So with NetBSD you can standardise your software even if you have a whole bunch of different, "incompatible" hardware, one of the strengths of the Unix-like system.

Darwin is a cousin of Free/Open/NetBSD, and the free foundation on which the commercial Mac OS X is built. Although its development was originally managed rather tightly by Apple (understandable, because their business depends on it) they've loosened the leash, making participation in the development fully open. So OpenDarwin is becoming an open-source OS in its own right. Any Darwin software will run on OS X, but software written specifically for OS X won't run on Darwin, because the Mac interface (and various other proprietary bits) are not part of Darwin itself. Instead, Darwin typically uses X11 with either TWM or KDE.

Amiga owners used to taunt PC and Mac users with their smoothly-multitasking graphical operating system, back when the Macs couldn't multitask, and PCs weren't even graphical. Even though the "classic" Amiga machines are no longer being produced, there's a lot of ongoing activity in Amigaspace: The OS is again being updated to support current technology (Amiga OS 4 is in development), an emulation layer called AmigaOSXL (aka AMIthlon) is available to run Amiga OS on modern PC hardware, Amiga Forever is an emulator for Windows and other operating systems, and a new hardware platform and OS called AmigaOne have been introduced to try to carry on the Amiga legacy.

MorphOS began as a project to port the Amiga OS to the then-new PowerPC architecture, but has since morphed into an OS in its own right. It runs on (and comes bundled with) the Pegasos platform, a PowerPC-based architecture (also supported by Linux and other OSes), and has better-than-standard-emulation support for Amiga OS 3.1 applications as well as native apps built for MorphOS.

RISC OS is the operating system of the former Acorn line of computers (best known in the UK), which has been revived and updated for faster performance and to meet current OS standards (e.g. long filenames, large hard drives). It doesn't run on standard PCs, but on systems specifically designed for it (such as the RiscPC and A7000), using the high-speed StrongARM processors. The OS itself is stored in electronic ROM rather than having to be loaded into RAM from a hard drive.

Syllable is based on AtheOS, building on the work done before AtheOS development stopped. It's a free alternative OS for standard PCs. It isn't specifically trying to copy Unix or BeOS or AmigaOS or anything else. But it uses some of the better ideas from these OSes, and because of the inherent portability of programs written in C++ for Unix, some of them can be easily ported to it (e.g. Apache, BIND, GCC, Emacs, vi, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby). It's not a full-featured OS yet, but it's functional enough to be useful.

GNU's Not Unix. In fact, that phrase is what G.N.U. is a (recursive) abbrevation for. It is a Unix-like operating system being developed as a long-term project by the Free Software Foundation to offer a fully-free alternative to the commercial and BSD versions of Unix. Although you'll find many key components of GNU used in Linux and BSD packages under the GNU General Public license (GPL), a fully GNU system will use the Hurd, GNU's own free-software kernel. The Hurd has some design advantages over the Linux kernel, but is still far from finished, and requires serious expertise with OS development to install.

Minix is a freeware Unix-like operating system developed for educational purposes. Because of its relative simplicity and ample documentation, its creator says that a few months studying the source code should teach you most of how such things work. (It inspired Linus Torvalds to create Linux.) It's not a very actively-maintained OS (since the hardware it runs on is all "old stuff", there's little point in keeping it "current"), but versions for both Intel-x86-compatible and Mac/Amiga/Atari hardware are available for download; by putting Minix on a discarded machine (e.g. a 286 or 68000 CPU), you can literally build a working computer system for free.

There are also a bunch of commercial UNIX® systems, which are typically customised to run on expensive, high-end, proprietary hardware sold by the same vendor. Most of them have names other than "Unix" due to old trademark issues. They're better as alternatives to the server versions of Windows NT/200X, not the desktop versions of Windows such as 98 and XP. They include Sun Solaris, HP-UX, IBM AIX, SGI IRIX. (Avoid SCO UnixWare; they're on a collision course with disaster.)

IBM's OS/2warp was once supposed to replace MS Windows, back when Emperor IBM and Darth Microsoft were planning to rule the galaxy together. Then Darth decided he didn't need the Emperor, struck confidential deals with other hardware vendors and software developers, and made Windows (just barely) powerful enough to fill OS/2's intended role. Windows didn't really beat OS/2 technically, but it won the Marketing Wars, which is what mattered. Unfortunately, IBM is giving up on OS/2's future, offering minor updates to support new technology, but no serious upgrades. A third-party package called eComStation is a licensed effort to update and maintain OS/2. It's still a stable, useful, Windows-like operating system with a rather loyal userbase.

Believe it or not, DOS (with or without Windows 3.1) is still a viable option for many uses. There was an incredible amount of software developed for it, and it still works. Plus, DOS runs like a champ, on old hardware that no one else wants. You can even fit it on a diskette, to boot it on nearly any PC anywhere. In addition to Microsoft's DOS (which you can probably get a computing old-timer to donate to you along with some of his "vintage" applications like WordPerfect 5.1, Lotus 1-2-3 r2.2, and dBASE III), there are modern, compatible DOSes in active use from other sources: the open-source clone FreeDOS (available instead of Windows on certain computers from Dell), IBM's PC-DOS, and DR DOS.

NOTE: If you want to use a different operating system, but still need to run Windows programs, you might be able to have it both ways. You can often set up your computer to run more than one OS: you just pick which one to use when you turn it on. For even more flexibility, there are "emulators" which will let you add another OS (or several) to your main OS, letting you click from one to another at will: VMware (lets you run Windows on Linux, or Linux on Windows), Win4Lin (Windows on Linux), Bochs (Windows or Linux on Mac, BeOS, Unix, Amiga, etc.), Amiga Forever (Amiga on Windows/Linux/Mac OS). Another option is WINE, a free package that adds enough Windows compatibility to Linux, FreeBSD, and Solaris so that many Windows programs (including MS Office) can run on them as if they were Linux programs.

# 2004-03-29 01:22 PM | TrackBack