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By Paul Ferris A lot of press has been generated surrounding the recent benchmark of NT verses Linux by Mindcraft . Everyone is pointing to technical inaccuracies, but few people seem to be noticing something rather interesting: The benchmark is being done on current software and Windows 2000 isn't even mentioned. I'd like to add my speculation to the fray of already heated discussion. If there ever was a king of stall-ware, Microsoft is it. They like to announce products far in advance of completion while their competitors are usually shipping functional software, in an attempt to get people to wait until the Microsoft solution arrives. But, here you have something different. With these benchmarks they have risked bringing people's focus upon Linux and at a rather precarious time. They must feel that they have just about settled their case with the Justice Department, otherwise they would be complaining about Linux and what a blow it is to their competitive edge. But they aren't, they are focusing on NT 4.0 verses Linux 2.2. Was the Benchmark badly tuned? Without a doubt. But you have to ask yourself why they are risking becoming Linux's new advertising firm, albeit in an unintentional manner, when they are also promising new technology. The new technology we speak of here is not of the NT type, but rather actual new technology in the guise of Windows 2000. Why do that, when your company policy in the past has been not to even mention a competitors name? Why? Because Windows 2000 is shaping up to be a real pig, and it won't stand a snowballs chance in a benchmark against an operating system that runs very nicely on old 386 hardware. When Windows 2000 ships, benchmarks will be a thing of the past for Microsoft marketing people. Up to date benchmarks, that is. You can rest assured that if the Linux community doesn't somehow give them a black eye over this, they will point to these results for years to come. Even when people find that Windows 2000 requires huge resources and screaming processors to provide adequate performance. How long have they touted Windows NT as C2 secure? Is Windows 4.0 certified C2 secure? No. The C2 security rating was only bestowed upon a special version of Windows 3.5 running on special hardware with networking removed. Many people still point to this rating, even though they should only do it with a nice asterisk by their face, and scrolling text by their chest running the proper disclaimer. And while they can argue that NT is C2 secure and run that disclaimer, I can just as easily argue that in this day and age if it doesn't include networking of some kind it's not an operating system. It can only be an act of desperation that has brought them here, to this crazy snowball fight in the Linux sandstorm. After all, if you were making klunkers and knew that your next model was going to be even worse, what to do but race now while there stands even a minute chance, as opposed to later, when you know you're going to lose. The slogan isn't "Where do you want to go tomorrow" after all. It's "Where do you want to go today". Maybe that's the real reason they are so upset with www.linux.de, and have asked them to remove the so-called trademark infringement from their web site. If people ask the latter question, surely the answer won't be a Microsoft solution. "Where do you want to go today" is a registered trademark of Microsoft
Corp.
 
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