% fortune -ae paul murphy

"And don't come back!"

How do you get invited never to darken someone's virtual doorways again? Ask the wrong question.

In the particular case of a Windows desktop virtualization demo the question I asked was a simple one: " How does this solution differ from delivering Windows application services via thin clients or smart displays like Sun Ray?"

The right answer, I think, is that using a Windows client running in a Windows OS to access Windows applications running on a Windows OS running as a time share on a Windows OS server over a Windows network is a lot more complicated, a lot slower, costs a lot more, is considerably less reliable, and is a lot less flexible than just about any other way of getting at those applications.

Sadly, that's not the answer they wanted anyone to think about - so I'm a moron, the question is "meaningless", my login id became unacceptable, and overall I thought it was about the clearest demonstration of Wintel marketing focus, intent, and value I've ever seen.


Paul Murphy wrote and published The Unix Guide to Defenestration. Murphy is a 25-year veteran of the I.T. consulting industry, specializing in Unix and Unix-related management issues.