Comparisons between the Microsoft Windows and Linux computer operating systems are a long-running discussion topic within the personal computer industry.[citation needed] Throughout the entire period of the Windows 9x systems through the introduction of Windows 7, Windows has retained an extremely large retail sales majority among operating systems for personal desktop use, while Linux has sustained its status as the most prominent Free Software and Open Source operating system. Both operating systems are present on servers, embedded systems, mobile internet devices as well as supercomputers. Linux and Microsoft Windows differ in philosophy, cost, versatility and stability, with each seeking to improve in their perceived weaker areas. Comparisons of the two operating systems tend to reflect their origins, historic user bases and distribution models. Typical perceived weaknesses regularly cited have often included poor consumer familiarity with Linux, and Microsoft Windows' susceptibility to viruses and malware.[1][2] Contents [hide] 1 Total cost of ownership o 1.1 Real world experience 2 Market share 3 User interface 4 Installation and Live environments 5 Accessibility and usability 6 Stability 7 Performance 8 Support 9 Platform for third party applications o 9.1 Gaming 10 Software development 11 Security o 11.1 Threats and vulnerabilities o 11.2 Security features and architecture 12 Localization 13 See also 14 References 15 External links [edit] Total cost of ownership See also: Studies related to Microsoft In 2004, Microsoft launched a marketing campaign, "Get the Facts", to encourage users to switch from Linux to its Windows Server System. Microsoft claims that its products have an overall lower total cost of ownership than open source programs because of their ease of use, resulting in less work and lower staff costs.[3] However, a variety of Linux supporters, companies, and organizations, notably Linux distributor Novell, which produces SUSE Enterprise Linux and tech news outlet The Register, dispute Microsoft's figures.[4][5][6][7] One argument supporting the cost-effectiveness of Linux is that although Linux administrators are usually paid somewhat higher salaries than Windows administrators, a competent Linux administrator can take care of more computers than the latter. A study conducted by Chad Robinson, senior research analyst at tech/business researcher Robert Frances Group, supports this view.[8][9] In 2004, The UK's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) warned Microsoft that an advertisement using research that claimed "Linux was […] 10 times more expensive than Windows Server 2003", was "misleading", as the hardware chosen for the Linux server was needlessly expensive. The ASA concluded that the comparison was misleading because the operating systems ran on different hardware.[10] [edit] Real world experience The German Foreign Office said that the cost of open source desktop maintenance is by far the lowest it experienced.[11] The French Gendarmerie reported saving millions on licence fees by switching to Linux desktops from Windows XP, following the success of OpenOffice.org roll- outs.[12] On the other hand, the project of switching Munich's governmental IT infrastructure from Microsoft based to open-source software, called LiMux, had problems finishing all objectives successfully. Started 2003 with the aim of switching 100% of 14,000 PCs to an open-source solution, the project was funded with 35 million euros, approximately the money a Microsoft solution would have cost. Even though more than 80% of workstations used OpenOffice and 100% used Firefox/Thunderbird five years later (November 2008),[13] an adoption rate of Linux itself of only 20.0% (June 2010) was achieved.[14][15] [edit] Market share See also: Usage share of desktop operating systems The market share of Linux or Microsoft Windows is difficult to determine as users of the former are usually not required to register with any organization to use their copies; additionally, a large number of unlicensed (illegal) copies of Windows exist. The following desktop usage share data is estimated from web browser user agent strings, rather than actual sales information or detailed surveys. This is highly unreliable for many reasons including, but not limited to, web browsers that do not always provide accurate information to web servers[citation needed], and selection bias: Different websites attract different audiences that may be more prone to using one operating system or another. Also, desktop computers used for other tasks will be given a lower weight than computers mostly used for web-surfing. Microsoft's own numbers for Linux share are higher.[16] Windows Linux Notes Estimated Web client data. desktop usage See the source share 82.47%[original research?] 2.41%[original research?] page for caveats median of the sources analysed in median of the sources analysed in for using web this page this page client data to estimate OS market share. Pre- Pre-installed by default on Pre-installed by default on installation almost all new desktop PCs. very few new desktop PCs. Among these are all System76 computers, some Dell computers, some Lenovo ThinkPads.[17][18] Server market 73.9% (officially registered)[19] 21.2% (officially registered)[19] Fourth quarter, share 2009 Top 500 1.2% (6 of 500)[20] 91.2% (456 of 500) November 2010 supercomputer operating the 14 fastest supercomputers Linux figure system family run Linux[20] does not include share 14 computers (2.8%) identified as running "CNK/SLES 9"[20] [21] [edit] User interface Windows Linux Graphical The Windows Shell. The window user manager is the Desktop Window interface Manager on Windows Vista, and a Stacking window manager built on top of GDI in older versions. The desktop environment may be modified by a variety of third party products such as The KDE Plasma Desktop WindowBlinds; or completely replaced, for example by Blackbox for Windows, A number of desktop environments are or LiteStep. With Windows Server 2008 available, of which GNOME and KDE and later server releases, there is also the are the most widely used. By default, option of running "Server Core" which they use the Metacity and KWin window lacks the standard window manager.[22] managers respectively, though these can The graphics drivers, subsystem, and core be replaced by other window managers, widgets are included with all such as Compiz Fusion. installations, including those used as servers. Other desktop environments and window managers include Xfce, LXDE, Enlightenment, Xmonad, Openbox, Fluxbox, etc. The X Window system runs in user-space and is optional.[23] Multiple X Window System instances can run at once, and it is a fully networked protocol. See also: Comparison of X Window System desktop environments The Wayland display server protocol is being developed to improve graphics performance[24] and move beyond the X Window System (also referred to as "X" or "X11"), with the intention of replacing X as the native display server.[25] Command- line interface A sample Windows PowerShell session The Command Prompt exists to provide A sample Bash session direct communication between the user and the operating system. A .NET-based Linux is strongly integrated with the command line environment called system console. The command line can Windows PowerShell has been be used to recover the system if the developed. It varies from Unix/Linux [27][28] graphics subsystem fails. A large shells in that, rather than using byte number of Unix shells exist, with the streams, the PowerShell pipeline is an majority being "Bourne shell object pipeline; that is, the data passed compatible". The most widely used is between cmdlets are fully typed objects. GNU Bash. Alternatives include the When data is piped as objects, the feature-full Z shell as well as shells based elements they encapsulate retain their on the syntax of other programming structure and types across cmdlets, languages such as the C shell and Perl without the need for any serialization or Shell. Many applications can be scripted explicit parsing of the stream. Cygwin, [29] through the system console. There are Mingw, or Microsoft's own Services for many small and specialized utilities Unix provides a shell terminal for available that are designed to work Windows.[26] Posix subsystem is built in together and integrate with other but not enabled by default. The Console programs. This is called the toolbox can execute up to 4 kinds of principle[citation needed]. environments, MSDOS scripts under NT or via Command.com running on NTVDM, NT shell scripts and OS/2 Console Scripts. Windows Script Host is included in Windows 98 and newer versions. [edit] Installation and Live environments Windows Linux Ease of On Windows Server 2003 and prior, the Varies greatly by distribution. Most Installation installation is divided into two stages; distributions intended for new or the first, text-mode; the second, intermediate users provide simple graphical.[30] On Windows Vista and graphical installers. newer, the installation is single stage and graphical. General purpose oriented distributions offer a live CD or GUI installer Some older versions require third party (openSUSE, Debian, Pardus, Pclinuxos, drivers (for example, by using driver Mandriva, Ubuntu, Fedora etc.), others floppies disks or slipstreaming the offer a menu-driven installer drivers and creating a new installation (Slackware, Debian) while others, CD) if using a large number of SATA targeting more specialized groups, or SATA2 drives or RAID arrays.[31] require source to be copied and compiled (Gentoo). The system can also be built completely from scratch, directly from source code (Linux from Scratch). Supported Windows: i386, x86-64 and IA-64 (IA- i386, x86-64, PowerPC 32/64, SPARC, Architectures 64 is Windows Server only). DEC Alpha, ARM, MIPS, PA-RISC, S390, IA-64, SuperH and m68k. Windows Embedded: i386, x86-64, PowerPC, ARM, MIPS, SuperH.[32] Windows Mobile: ARM Device driver The Windows installation media usually Linux kernels in most distributions contains enough drivers to make the include the majority of drivers available operating system functional.