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Comment by explainplease | Hacker News Reader

Maybe he feels like it would be more beneficial if the work were put into WINE instead.

There are lots of people who could switch to Linux if certain apps worked well under WINE. With the anti-user shenanigans Microsoft is doing in Windows now (e.g. using upstream bandwidth to seed updates, sucking up people's Internet connections, and potentially busting their data caps), this is needed now more than ever.

But no one's going to replace Windows with ReactOS. For example, is ReactOS going to keep up with drivers for current hardware? Of course not. Do they regularly release security updates? No. But Linux and Linux distros already do. So improving WINE helps people actually switch off Windows to a safer, less anti-user system.

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> is ReactOS going to keep up with drivers for current hardware? Of course not.

Unlike Linux, ReactOS doesn't need to: one of the design goals was to provide binary compatibility with regular Windows drivers.

That's really neat if it works out. But doesn't this mean that users have to own a copy of Windows to use those drivers legally? Maybe they can download some drivers from manufacturer sites, and maybe some of their EULAs don't require the user to own a copy of Windows, but I'd be surprised if many users could run a machine with only Windows drivers without any of the drivers included in Windows releases.

But even if that all works as well as it does in Windows, it's still inferior to Linux. Users are stuck with whatever binary drivers they can get, and whatever reverse-engineered, bug-for-bug compatibility the ReactOS developers can manage. It would be much better for users if they could run WINE on Linux.

This isn't an either/or situation. The ReactOS developers collaborate heavily with the WINE developers, so many updates to ReactOS also benefit WINE and vice-versa.

That sounds nice, but wouldn't it be better if the effort were put toward WINE alone?

I just don't understand. WINE is like a necessary evil, a noble sacrifice of its developers' time to enable users to switch from Windows to a free, open platform for the applications they can't run on one natively. It's a sensible abstraction that enables something that wouldn't otherwise be possible.

But why reimplement Windows, the whole OS? If the devs enjoy it, it's their time to use as they choose. But the end result would be much more beneficial for users if it were put toward WINE so users could leave the Windows platform behind.

>is ReactOS going to keep up with drivers for current hardware?

They don't need to. They do implement whatever needed to have ABI compatibility with actual Windows drivers, so the vendor driver should work.

That sounds really cool. But:

1. I presume this requires "bug-for-bug compatibility." How feasible is this without access to either the Windows source code or a lab full of machines and QA staff?

When a user gets a ReactOS BSOD because of a bug in the ReactOS driver ABI, what do they do? Even if they can report a bug and it eventually gets fixed, what do they do in the meantime? The answer is, probably, boot back into Windows and get their work done. Then they have to justify to themselves taking the time to try ReactOS again sometime in the future.

2. How many machines in the wild can run without any Microsoft-made drivers included in Windows releases? If the answer is less than 100%, those users will still have to own a copy of Windows.

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