Here's an idea. (more of a crazy dream, but its interesting)

What if MS borrowed a MacOSX idea, and dropped there current OS.. just binned it.
then, took a *BSD or GNU/Linux OS, but instad of using GNOME or KDE, ported the vurrently existing windowsXP Desktop Envodonment to run on Xorg-x11.

They could build a portage free like what Gentoo uses, except with pre-compiled binaries.

Now you would have an OS which looked and felt exactly like Windows, except running on a BSD or Linux Kenrel and libraries.

Good bye securety issues and virus scanners, hello inherrant securety that comes with a true multi user envoronment.

THEN... Microsoft would work with the Wine / Cedeger project (which emulates windowsXP)
at the moment Wine and Cedeger are good, but they dont quite run all windows porgrams, and are not yet DirectX9 compatable.

IF microsoft gave the WIne hackers access to see, and use Windows source code, they would very quickly build a PERFECT emulator.

Also, MS could give the kernel hackers access to the windows kernel, and allow them to use parts of it.
armed with the window source code, the Linux and BSD kernel developers could build a compatability layer into linux / BSD that would allow Windows Drivers to work with Linux / BSD.

Windows software and drivers ould all work on linux.

HOWEVER.... Windows would keep its Graphical Desktop environment closed source, and not free.

this way MS could continue selling Desktop OS's similar to how MacOSX is sold.. the base of OSX is free, however apple makes its money by selling the graphical component of the OS.

OK, this is all just a dream... but is MS were so inclined, there is no reason this couldnt be done.

however im sure MS would never ever dream of doing this, maing windows and linux this compatable would almost certainly tempt windows users to have a look at 100% free desktop's like KDE, GNOME, NEXTSTEP BlackBox and so fourth.

i don't know.... i prefer windows OS over linux (not just desktop).....
inherent multiuser platoform is not always technically virus free.... right now it is because most crackers make virsuses for windows.. if all this happens, linux viruses will bloom!

i don't think so amkint.. as qwijibow said, if they still retain the inner working core of *nix/bsd and used just the windows gui on top - then the system would inherit all the security features of linux as well as its immense power of handling multi-user networked environments... along with that it will inherit the the way *nix handles user/file rights which presently makes it so difficult for viruses to spread on *nix platforms...

i think it's a brilliant idea except that MS & Open Source doesn't go hand in hand - even in the wildest dreams. And imbibing a part of the *nix kernel into their OS would in effect deliver a rock solid blow to their bloated up ego... it would be their clearcut admittance as to which is the better OS among the two

But what if all the companys got together (Long shot) and then Viruses would be dealt with within like minutes of hitting a system. Same code, same virus, thousands of developers, no more virii but we all know that wont happen but dreams are worth keeping.

lol I assure you if it was that simple

Linux would have been © 2004 Microsoft Coroporation along time ago

they tend to BUY anything they like and release it with a MS name now

Except they can't buy linux or even BSD. Otherwise they probably would have.

It would be funny if they did though. But with closed source they do dig holes for themselfs.

If MS did that, all those programmers developing programs for windows will have to start over, and perhaps the stock market will crash, causing the second Great Depression!!!

not necceserily.. like i said, if micfosoft co-operated with the wine and cedeger projects, it wouldnt be too dificultto build a 100% compatable win32 emulator. for windows applications.

Plus, MS are always making changes to the way they want developers to write applications, first it was MFC, then .NET and next AVALON. Porting to QT or GTK or raw X11 wouldnt kill anyone.

soon QT will be available for windows, meaning any windows porgrams using qt will be even easyer to port to *NIX.

To peopl who think Linux who think that linux would get virii if it was a more popular os, i dont think you understand how *nix works.

for example... lets say i am fooled into running an application from an untrused source that contains a virus.. (social engioneering is commonly being used by virii developers)

that means that the virus has the same access rights, as the person who executed it.
the virus cannot....
cannot Write to the main file system
cannot read system logs
cannot read keystrokes unless it has focus (cannot key log passwords or email)
cannot read or chanmge the firewall.
cannot ping broadcast (see smurf)

it cant write to the file system, therfore it is unable to infect any files.

all it can do, is delete my homework.

and this is assuming that it even managed to run in the first place... my machine is setup so that only files owned by root can be executed... so any virus i download, count run.
(but this is not default on most systems)

the ONLY way a virus could infect my computer is if it knew a privilage esulation exploit in a locally running server.

windows virii do this all the time... the majority of Windows machines out there are all windowsXP, sp1 or sp2.. only 3 different versions, some versions have common exploits.

in linux, every machine is different... there are hundreds of different distro's each with different versions of different porgrams, compilled with different compilers, and different securety settings...

if an exploit was known to a virus, that virus may only be able to infect 1 in every few hundred or maybe thousand linux machines...

and as the formulae says.... if the rate of discovery of infection is larger than the rate at which new machines are infected, then the virus dies.

and with all the detection tools on linux, like packet sniffers, tripwires, rootkit hunters, and system logs, virii are usually discovered very quickly.

there are many many linux virii out there...but only very small number of machines are vunerable to them, and systems are patched sooo quikly, that none of them can breed fast enough to survive.

*nix envoronmenst are very hostile to virii.

Its Access rights that mean somthing like this
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/1565.html
could never happen in linux

in linux, the suer, and therefore vius would not have high enough privilages to stop securety programs, that would need root.

however in windows, any user, or virus with zero privilages can easily send a shutdown message telling the kernel to terminate whatever program it likes.. even the virus scanners.