48 best free apps from Microsoft
in [Freeware]
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From: Anonymous Remailer (austria) on 2 Feb 2010 21:34 KristleBawl wrote: > Okay, so let me see if I understand you. If I already bought and paid > for genuine Windows OEM on a new computer, then any freeware I install > is only freeware if it is *not* also made by Microsoft? NO! It's only free if it's not a legal requirement that said software be RUN in said environment. That exacts a cost. If it's perfectly legal to run the software under Wine, just as an example, then the software exacts no cost itself REGARDLESS of whether you're a licensed Window$ owner or a Wine user. Can you grasp the difference yet?
From: Anonymous Remailer (austria) on 2 Feb 2010 21:40 Craig wrote: > On 02/02/2010 03:24 PM, Bear Bottoms wrote: > >> To people running Windows the programs are free of any additional cost >> no matter what... > > -but- > >> It is still freeware for Windows users. > > "[F]ree of any /additional/ cost" and "freeware" are not one in the > same. > >> If you are not running Windows, why bother with Windows software... > > You might not have read my earlier post on this but, IE is a requirement > for accessing the vendor databases of two of our customers. That is why > we bothered. > > We could download, install & run IE on WINE. We had no need for > Windows... except that MS requires that we pay for a Windows user > license. Hence, to run IE legally, we had to buy a Windows license. Bottom's problem is quite likely a lack of experience exasperated by his narrowness of vision. The poor sot probably doesn't have any sort of real life experience outside whatever he can reach from his computer chair. He just can't grasp the big picture.
From: Craig on 2 Feb 2010 21:48 On 02/02/2010 06:23 PM, KristleBawl wrote: > I agree that IE is not freeware and I said right along I was not talking > about IE. *You* brought up IE in this thread. Ok. Good. > There are *other* apps > listed in the OP link that *are* freeware, but not very many. Only the > ones that are *not* bundled, even though they are only offered /to > Windows users/ as freeware. Whether they're freeware would depend on the licensing. Same as with IE. > As a Windows user, I cannot install Mac or Linux freeware apps... Oh yes, you can. Often that's because a lot of their apps are written to libraries which are cross-platform. Consider this partial list from Wikipedia. GTK apps: * AbiWord - Word processor * CinePaint * Ekiga (ex GnomeMeeting) - VoIP and video conferencing application * Evolution - personal information manager * GIMP - Raster graphics editor * Gnumeric - Spreadsheet software * Chromium - Web browser based upon WebKit * GRAMPS - Genealogy software * Inkscape - SVG Vector graphics editor * K-3D - free 3d modeling and animation program * Marionnet - An interactive network simulator * Midori - lightweight web browser * Nero Linux - An optical disc media authoring program * Pidgin - Instant messaging * VMware Player - virtualization software * Wireshark - packet analyzer A lot of these and more besides were written by *nix users for *nix. But the communities grew to include other platforms. So yes, you can install a lot of Linux (can't say much about OSX) apps. > but that doesn't make them not freeware. I agree. > You can't have it both ways. If > you insist that Windows freeware is not freeware because you have to buy > Windows, then you might as well say Mac freeware is not freeware, > either, because you have to buy a Mac. Again, that would depend on the application's license. There is no "both ways" about this. > Linux isn't freeware, either, > because you have to buy the hardware to install it on. Well, that's a separate and distinct topic. -- -Craig
From: Craig on 2 Feb 2010 21:51 On 02/02/2010 06:40 PM, Anonymous Remailer (austria) wrote: > Craig wrote: > >> On 02/02/2010 03:24 PM, Bear Bottoms wrote: >> >>> To people running Windows the programs are free of any additional cost >>> no matter what... >> >> -but- >> >>> It is still freeware for Windows users. >> >> "[F]ree of any /additional/ cost" and "freeware" are not one in the >> same. >> >>> If you are not running Windows, why bother with Windows software... >> >> You might not have read my earlier post on this but, IE is a requirement >> for accessing the vendor databases of two of our customers. That is why >> we bothered. >> >> We could download, install& run IE on WINE. We had no need for >> Windows... except that MS requires that we pay for a Windows user >> license. Hence, to run IE legally, we had to buy a Windows license. > > Bottom's... I honestly think I might have a hard time finding the relevance to my argument if all I worked & played in were Windows. But, as BB prolly already knows, I'm not talking just to him. If anyone gets something from this thread... Cool. -- -Craig
From: Craig on 2 Feb 2010 21:52
On 02/02/2010 06:09 PM, John Corliss wrote: > Craig wrote: >> »Q« wrote: >>> KristleBawl wrote: >>> >>> ... >>>> Linux users can also get a lot of programs to work using Wine. >>> >>> If it's freeware, that's fine. For a GNU/Linux user to download and >>> run Microsoft alleged "freeware", s/he'd need to buy a license for it >>> first. (And even then, MS EULAs generally forbid running their >>> software on anything other than a licensed MS OS, even if you've paid >>> for it.) >> >> We ran across this issue when we were required by a couple of (large) >> customers to run Internet Explorer so as to access their supplier >> databases. There are ways to run IE6 in WINE but, apart from the >> kludge-factor, the MS EULA requires a valid MSOS license & that it be >> run on MSOS. >> >> IE, then, is "free to download" and nothing more. IE still costs $ due >> to the licensing. > > Excellent point, Craig. One that's eluded me until now. Thanks for that > example. <curtsy> That was y.a. rubber-hits-the-road moment for me. And, again, as long as most of us are in a windows-only environment, I fully understand how this can sound... esoteric. -- -Craig |