

ReactOS - ertug
http://www.reactos.org/en/index.html

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coderdude
ReactOS is one of those projects that has been on the net for a long time. You
see it resurface every now and then and each time it looks better than it did
before. I have to hand it to the their team, they have tenacity.

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VeXocide
For others like me who are unfamiliar with the word tenacity: "The state or
quality of being tenacious", which in turn is "Holding or tending to hold
persistently to something, such as a point of view" or "Tending to retain;
retentive".

~~~
coderdude
When I use that word I'm conveying "doggedness: persistent determination."
(It's part of my Googled vocabulary.) Either way, it's certainly meant as a
compliment. :)

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mapleoin
> Either way, it's certainly meant as a complement. :)

While we're at it, you should also read this:
<http://www.google.com/search?q=complement+vs+compliment>

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coderdude
Thank you, sir. I honestly didn't realize I had been using the wrong
compl*ment all these years.

~~~
richbradshaw
I think the right word was compliment. Complement means goes well with,
compliment means a good comment.

~~~
tome
I suspect coderdude edited his post to change the spelling.

~~~
coderdude
I did. I wasn't trying to be secretive about it either, considering I was
quoted and I then thanked him for pointing it out. Have I confused anyone
here?

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ComputerGuru
I reviewed it back in 2006. It has not changed much since, though it has some
graphics subsystem and USB improvements:
<http://neosmart.net/blog/2006/reactos-the-next-windows/>

Screenshots of ReactOS (it BSODs too!):
<http://neosmart.net/gallery/album/view/os/ROS/>

I'm surprised not to see mention of this though in the comments here: ReactOS
is now "dead" as it is being rewritten to use the wine project as the actual
codebase. The aforementioned slowness in development is the primary cause. The
new project is codename ARWINSS: <http://www.reactos.org/wiki/Arwinss>

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daeken
It seems that ARWINSS is purely a replacement for a few userspace components
(specifically user32 and gdi32, not that those are small by any means (having
written my own implementations, my hat goes off to anyone who attempts it)),
not the ROS kernel and all that entails. Am I incorrect here? The reason I
follow ROS is that it allows compatibility with existing NT drivers, which is
huge in my opinion, so moving away from the ROS kernel would be a Bad Thing
(TM) in my eyes.

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TomOfTTB
Kudos to the creators for keeping at it. But in the end I don't see if being
of much consequence.

If it ever does get out of Alpha and is viable than Microsoft will likely stop
at nothing to bury it with lawsuits. They'd have to because it would be a free
version of their core product that, by definition, wouldn't be susceptible to
all the viruses and malware that Windows is.

So the bottom line is it could have a lot of useful applications but you
really couldn't have enough faith in its future to use it for those
applications.

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calcnerd256
Why wouldn't it be susceptible to malware? The fact that that question is even
worth asking demonstrates that you've abused the phrase "by definition"

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coderdude
I would say it could still be susceptible to malware since a lot of it gets
installed on account of user stupidity, but anything that requires
exploitation of a specific memory address will fail. Of course though, I think
the latest version of Windows has protection against that as well by making it
difficult or impossible to determine what addresses will be used when a
program is ran. (Maybe, my memory of that is admittedly fuzzy.)

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csomar
So what's the point of this Operating System? Kill Microsoft and the thousands
of developers that are working their just because you don't like them or the
name of the company?

Wouldn't this huge time and effort be spent on something we need but don't
have? And yes, charge me for using it. I study medicine, but I won't work as a
doctor for free.

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dRother
You might want to look into the concept 'open source' and study the phenomenon
known as 'linux'. It sounds as if you've never heard of either one.

~~~
memoryfault
I think the term you wanted him to look up was 'free software'.

[http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-
point.h...](http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html)

~~~
dRother
Oops, RMS probably would have punched me for that.

Okay, look into 'free software' and the phenomenon known as 'GNU'.

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volomike
Prediction: ReactOS will be little more than an OS used for running Windows-
less video games that were designed for Windows.

In the time spent fiddling with it, you could have just purchased and XBox and
been done with it.

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younata
A free/Open source clone of the most successful virus ever created!</unix
zealot>

Basically, these guys decided they legally wanted windows, but they didn't
want to pay for it.</snark>

It's a cool idea, but, I'm not exactly sure on a) the legality of it and b)
the usefulness of it.

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mansr
I don't think there are any legal issues here (but IANAL), and I can see a
free Windows clone being useful to some people. However, Microsoft has a
25-year head start so these guys have some serious catching up to do. Until
Microsoft goes out of business, I doubt they will ever have a system
compatible with a current Windows version.

~~~
rbanffy
> I don't think there are any legal issues here

Just imagine how many patents Microsoft will be compelled to use against this
project if it ever becomes a perceived threat.

I am sure all MS's EULAs prohibit you from running Microsoft software on
anything other than Windows.

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tptacek
Add this to the list of things you're "sure" about, but shouldn't be.

Nowhere in the EULA for Microsoft Office (their most profitable product) do I
find text requiring you to run it on Microsoft Windows. I read it top-to-
bottom, then searched for "Windows" (which never occurs) and then "operating
system" (which occurs only to warn you that they use your operating system to
get to the Internet).

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ratsbane
This is correct on the face of it. However, some of the terms, though vague,
effectively prohibit running Office under Wine, etc. The following phrase
occurs in the Office 2007 EULA: "...In doing so, you must comply with any
technical limitations in the software that only allow you to use it in certain
ways." The phrase "...technical limitations..." is present four times in
total; particularly combined with some of the license verification verbage
certainly could be used in legal arguments as rbanffy suggested

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tptacek
Which specific technical limitations would you be referring to?

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ratsbane
How would you interpret the phrase "...In doing so, you must comply with any
technical limitations in the software that only allow you to use it in certain
ways?"

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tptacek
I thought you might know of one, specifically, that binds Office '07 to
Windows (and not simply a faithful reimplementation of WinAPI).

