Windows Monoculture Myopia Revisited 319
round stic writes "eWeek magazine has an interesting look at the effects of the Windows monoculture on IT budgets, even as everyone agrees on the severity of the inherent security risks. The article contains interviews with Dan Geer and others who warned about the risks of the Windows monopoly three years ago. The article coincides with a piece in the Observer that suggests Vista is the end of the Microsoft monolith because of how complex the operating system has become."
TFA perpetuates myth (Score:5, Insightful)
From the article:
Why do people keep perpetuating this myth? It should be widely known by now that all the important Linux developers get paid by their respective employers to work on the kernel. That's possibly the most significant sign of widespread acceptance of the open-source development model -- that companies such as IBM would pay their own employees to do work on a public project that is not exclusively to their own benefit.
In the same sentence, the author managed to confuse "richest" with "smartest" as well. I'm not very impressed with this article.
Please read the Observer article before commenting (Score:5, Insightful)
Why? Because the article is not about the downfall of MS as the headline seems to suggest, but about the way complex software is build. It suggest that building big, monolithic applications has reached an end as Vista shows that even a huge company like MS can't really write complex software in this way anymore.
Now agree or disagree with this, but please spare us the "OMG MS will never die" comments.
I'm no expert, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Windows monopoly (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Please read the Observer article before comment (Score:3, Insightful)
Interestingly, they have also all found the solution to the extensibility problem: modularization. Indeed, MS Office macros, Mozilla plugins, and Linux kernel modules are all popular ways to add functionality, and they work reasonably well. Of course, you need the whole of MS Office, Mozilla, or Linux (at least the binary and the headers) for this to work, and new versions of the monolithic software often break the modules. And it still doesn't solve the complexity of maintaining the monolithic software; thus they are all still full of vulnerabilities, Windows still crashes, Mozilla still leaks memory, etc.
Re:TFA perpetuates myth (Score:4, Insightful)
End backward compatibility (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the UI is fine and they should keep it fairly consistent. But if they'd just lose having to support things that ran on 95, 98, 2000, ME,
And dump the registry, that was a really stupid idea.
But I think this could work. Most new copies of the OS are sold on computers built by Dell and other pc makers so they can control what goes in them. Hardware could be certified to work on the new version. Fairly new hardware could get new drivers that could be loaded on and it would work too. But older stuff would just get left behind.
Anyway, just a thought. On a random note, painting a two story house by yourself sucks!
Re:Just to add to this.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, we sysadmins can relate to certain icons in any language but it's not as strong as knowing command line scripting and making the computer do stuff through that. A script is in general not made to click on certain well-known places but instead executes some commands that have effect on the computer.
That is why *nix (Linux, BSD,
I am a Mac sysadmin for a large company and I can get the computers in Singapore to do the same things I let the local branches do but I have generally no idea what to do when I'm using Remote Desktop.
But what about INERTIA? (Score:5, Insightful)
There are approximately one grillion machines running XP and Windows 2000, and doing their jobs more or less successfully (if not securely), and being supported. Many (most?) will not be upgraded to Vista, given the high costs and dubious benefits. So they will stay the same.
How does this work out to the end of the monolith?
Re:TFA perpetuates myth (Score:3, Insightful)
Where would they both be now if they stopped fighting in, say, 1999?
Re:TFA perpetuates myth (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not like there's one absolute "smartest software company on the planet", but if there were, Microsoft would probably have a pretty good claim on the title. In terms of their developers, they have a lot of very smart people in the business working for them. In terms of business, they are one of the most successful companies on the planet. You might not like them, but I don't see how you can deny that they're smart by any relevant standard.
Free Software as a simple consequence of economics (Score:3, Insightful)
The Free Software Movement is not really driven by idealistic motives, but rather by a simple economic fact: because its marginal cost (i.e. the asymptotic cost of producing an extra copy) is null, free market forces and competition are bound to make all useful pieces of software freely available.
Note this is different from music or art in general: in art, the novelty/originality of a piece of work has an intrinsic value, which is not the case for software.
Some more elaboration of the idea: Software is meant to be free [baudel.name]
Re:TFA perpetuates myth (Score:5, Insightful)
Talk about perpetuating myths! They did outperform their rivals, by definition. You can't argue that they abused their monopoly powers in order to *become* a monopoly. They outperformed their competitors, achieved market dominance, and THEN achieved their monopoly status. I know it's hard for you to admit, but at one time MS was the scrappy little guy competing against entrenched giants like IBM, HP, DEC,
Re:End of the monopoly... (Score:3, Insightful)
The amount of crap he doesn't have to deal with is even more astounding. Off course he knows that other people ( like me ) chose differently but he doesn't care and I also noted that he doesn't find other people reasons convincing.
Re:Just to add to this.... (Score:3, Insightful)
But did MS add anything? MS didn't do anything to make GUIs popular, it was GUIs that made MS popular. If MS didn't exist GUIs would have still became popular, because that is what people want. If MS didn't exist we would still be using GUIs now, except we would be complaining about Apple computer's evil monopoly.
MS didn't really do anything significant other than being in the right place at the right time, with the right contract with IBM.
bullshit (Score:3, Insightful)
Alternatives to Windows are free. As in beer. As in licensing costs: $0. License management costs: $0. Time spent calling to re-license the operating system because you installed a sound card: $0. License audit exposure: $0. As in infinity% cheaper than Windows. As in incremental cost per unit = 0. The cost of alternative supporting application and utility software is $0. Alternative database application software is $0. Alternative firewall softare is $0. Alternative antivirus software (if and as applicable) is $0. Word processing software - $0. Systems/network management tools - wait for it - $0. Documentation [gentoo.org],comprehensive howto resources [tldp.org], and technical support [ubuntuforums.org] - all $0.
Turning away from solutions such as Linux because of cost is like being on fire and turning away from a bucket of water because the water might be too hot. Arguing against alternatives to Windows on the basis of cost is the very height of idiocy and is ultimately disingenuous. The real issue when considering alternatives is the fear of change and organizational inertia. How much of either can your company afford?
Re:TFA perpetuates myth (Score:4, Insightful)
Here at Brasil, the word "smart" doesn't always means "intelligent". For us at Rio de Janeiro, "smart" (esperto in portuguese) is someone that is good at taking advantage over other people, by ignoring the rules or fair-play.
So, in a way... yes, Microsoft is full of "smart" people.
Re:End backward compatibility (Score:2, Insightful)
They are not running some school project; they build operating systems that run on 99% of computers. So MS as a company needs to throw away their mature codebase and build a new operating system from scratch? And alienate millions of existing customers by breaking compatibility? And facilitate 3rd party apps instead of promoting their own products? Wishful thinking maybe; but insightful? hardly.
Re:TFA perpetuates myth (Score:5, Insightful)
If people know anything about the Unix wars then it would become very clear that Unix vendors were fighting amongst each other to 'lock in' customers by deliberatelly making their unix versions incompatible in the eighties. It was a real mess, because if you bought one unix licence, you had to have your apps written for it, and you couldn't move without massive expense.
This wasn't the unix philosophy, it was the 'make loads of money' philosophy, and it wrecked unix as a serious platform for most businesses at the time (not meaning huge businesses here).
Meanwhile this tiny little company called microsoft offered a cheap and easy way out of the mess, called DOS. Ok, it was a bit shit, and ripped off CP/M something rotten, but it did what business wanted, and meant they could get away from the ravages of the Unix wars. Plus it was offered by IBM, which sounded very good indeed at the time, and was available on other hardware to if the IBM stuff was too costly.
I tried DOS back in the day, and it was ok. Not great, but ok. I prefer Linux now, but back then Unix was what the cool guys down at the local powerstation used when I was a kid.
Nowadays I prefer Linux for coding. I never use normal Unix, except for the odd dabble in BSD to produce ports of software. Until Linix though I never would have considered Unix as a serious platform to develop for. When I encountered it at Uni they still had four different Unix versions, and I had to re-code for each one, which meant I used the Solaris boxes, and nothing else until the first Linux boxes appeared, as duel boots with windows, and I was hooked.
So yes, there was a time when microsoft were the good guys, just as there was a time when IBM were the bad guys.
Re:But what about INERTIA? (Score:1, Insightful)
Sorry, but I deal with the same type of Mac users where I work. I'd love to get rid of the Macs, and hopefully the majority of the idiots behind those keyboards.
Re:End of a monopoly (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:TFA perpetuates myth (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure you can.
Yes, they were the little guy. But that all changed when IBM stupidly entered into a contract allowing Microsoft to ship the OS on every IBM PC, while still retaining the software rights. This brought the company massive revenues as PCs became a commodity, allowing them to expand into other markets.
They did not outperform anyone; they were in the right place and got lucky.
Re:End of a monopoly (Score:3, Insightful)
I think vista will pull it off eventually. But only because of the existence of Linux, if M$ fails with vista it's kaputt.
Re:What is competition (Score:3, Insightful)
"They got set up as the default and made their software good enough."
Note I didn't just say good, nor did I say not bad.
They just made it good enough so people didn't really look for an alternative.
I disagree with this article (Score:4, Insightful)
I can't really agree with this. The major problems came when Microsoft decided, after about two years in development since the start in ~2002, that they were to change the foundation of "Longhorn" from Windows XP SP2 to Windows Server 2003. This was also by the time Microsoft changed their goals of what their next OS should be. Yes, when it was in the middle of development! Development managers may start feeling dizzy now and consider leaving Microsoft.
I wouldn't even want to do it in a personal software project.
To see the problem, check out this build 5048 review [winsupersite.com] (build 5000 was the kernel switch) with screenshots. It looks almost like "old Windows" again with mostly the same old features after a few years in development? Windows enthusiast Paul Thurrott is screaming blood. What happened to the progress they had made? Well, they had to strip a ton of features to get their stuff working again. Say hello to huge two year delays, feature cuts, and sweating.
So Vista seems to me to be more about a planning/design mistake than a complex beast that will take around 5 years to get out the door. Vista has actually only had around 2-2.5 years of uninterrupted development on the correct kernel and with the final goal of what it should even do!
I'd like to object to the article and actually claim I'm impressed by how quickly Microsoft put together something that looks to even end up as stable during that short time with this many features, given the stupidity that went on in planning. Or rather in-development-planning.
Of course, WinFS and other technologies had to go due to this wild change of focus in mid-development, but that's not surprising or a lack of efficiency due to having think of backwards compatibility, like this article claims.
But it's at the same time very visible how Microsoft is struggling, and I'm doubting we will see a clean release of this one when it "goes gold".
embracement (Score:3, Insightful)
if you think about it, this could mean that ms ships as a host operating system and one preinstalled 'guest' operating system.
from this point on, anyone can run his sw in windows, older versions of windows (with which it is competing) and most of all: any linux distro or other OS.
this further on means, that non-technical people will run linux on their boxes, like any other application. for them, there is no big difference whether it's an application or a complete operating system. this means also, that ms has found it's niche, where it always was. the end user. i doubt that there will be many non-technicals, that will later change to have another OS as their host operating system.
this also solves the 64bit problem, the old 32 bit apps can still be run.
Re:You forget business volume licensing (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:bullshit (Score:3, Insightful)
WINE is surprisingly mature these days. You can run many business apps on it today. No MS-Windows license required.
These are the only quibbles I have with your analysis. I was going to respond in a similar fashion. But I thought I'd jump in with my thoughts on these two points.
Interesting assumptions (Score:4, Insightful)
It's interesting the unstated assumption in the arguments against heterogenity: that any given company must support multiple platforms for heterogenity to work. I don't think that's true, though. If any given company uses a single platform, but different companies choose different single platforms, the end result is much the same overall: exploits have a much smaller target they'll work on.
And further, I don't think the arguments about the cost of supporting multiple platforms hold up. There's more than enough research supporting the contention that it takes fewer people to support Unix-based desktops than Windows-based ones, and that makes sense given the remote-admin capabilities built into desktop Unix that come from it's server roots. So suppose a company switches to a 50/50 mix of Windows and Linux desktops, and a Linux tech can support twice as many desktops as a Windows tech could. Yes, supporting two platforms costs more than supporting one. But at the same time you've just halved the number of Windows support people you need because you've got half the number of Windows desktops (assuming you've got more than 1 or 2 people could support). You need to replace them with Linux support people, but you only need 1 Linux guy added for every 2 Windows guys you're dropping. If you started with 4 Windows techs, you'd drop 2 Windows techs and add 1 Linux tech for a total of 3 techs now. That's a 25% drop in personnel costs. When figuring costs, you have to add in the reduction in personnel costs as well. Plus there's the reduction in licensing costs that offset any increase from having multiple platforms.
And finally, there's the BSA. We've all read the reports about their audits and the havoc they create. If your company's already supporting non-proprietary platforms, you're in a much better position to do an Ernie Ball if the BSA gives you grief.
Re:bullshit (Score:3, Insightful)
"But expertise costs money!"
When you hired your current IT expertise, did you buy carbon, water, phosphorus, etc. and construct them from scratch? Or did you have an expectation that they would be an assembled organism and that they (I know this is a wild idea) might actually bring some knowledge and experience with them to the job interview? Do you have expectations for them that they might need to continually brush up on that knowledge and be prepared to deploy new types of systems? Vista != XP != Windows 2000 != Windows 2003 server. Do you have the slightest expectation that they will, as a matter of personal professional development, be prepared to learn new things? Has it occurred to you that you can hire people with the same level of expertise and experience with Linux?
Point - you are already paying for expertise. The question is whether or not that expertise is appropriate to the needs of your organization. The ubiquity of Windows knowledge can blind you to the reality that someone had to learn it from scratch at some point in the past. When you work with IT, and when you hire IT people, that expectation is built in from the start. Are you suggesting that Linux requires expertise and Windows does not? If not, then the option of not investing in expertise is not on the table. Therefore, the question of the cost of Windows expertise vs. Linux expertise is a zero sum game.
Re:TFA perpetuates myth (Score:5, Insightful)
The other half is the Hardware Story.
SGI, HP, Digital, IBM, AT&T, all the big Unix vendors did have their own OS flavor. (At least shell scripting was mostly portable). But they also had their own hardware, mostly with different CPU architectures. Compiled binaries couldn't run on the different hardware platforms, even if they were written using the same damn libraries. The problem with this was that the hardware was damn expensive, so once you were locked in, they could totally assrape you on hardware.
Then the IBM PC platform came out, which was enough of a standard, and performed "good enough" on the low end, and was dirt cheap because of the fact that everybody could manufacture them to the same standard, and prices went down-down-down while performance improved. I remember paying $4000 for an IBM PC (an 086) with 16 MB of RAM, back in the 1980's. Monochrome screen. It had a "turbo" button you could press to make it run at 12 MHz instead of 10 MHz - (you could screw up timing in games and animations if you ran it at 12). When you look at the advent of the "sub-$1000" market in the late 1990's, those machines totally outclassed the top end in the 1980's, and they outclassed a lot of these proprietary Unix vendors' desktop machines as well.
DOS was just the cheap OS you could run on these cheap systems. But the real savings came in the hardware realm. They still do - compare perhaps the LAST hardware-holdout, Sun, to an intel-compatible system. Price-performance wise, it's not even close, in the desktop area.
One by one, these vendors either dropped out, got bought out, or switched to Intel architecture, to save themselves costs on the back-end. But most of them didn't forget their old "ways", and still charged a hardware premium.
Eventually, even Apple switched to intel chips; because the specialty CPU vendor just could not keep up, even with "superior" architecture. (whatever happened to "twice as fast"?).
The inexorable slide towards monoculture, ironically, was because of the overall cross-fertilization and competition in the huge intel-compatible-PC market. Within each Unix-vendor's hardware market, they were a monopoly, a monoculture. Each one lost out because, despite their best efforts to prevent compatability, the customers switched to the intel-compatable platforms.
While we still have competition on the intel-compatable side (many CPU vendors, many Motherboard vendors, many adapter card vendors, many HD vendors, etc.) - prices will remain competitively low. But the market is consolidating, and has been for about a decade. The best news is that intel is losing the overwhelming dominance it's had for a long time.
It's ironic, that one of the tools for eliminating hardware dependency, Java, came out of the last hardware-holdout, and it perhaps saved Sun from losing the last slice of marketshare it had. (in addition to their intel offerings). Sun embraced multiculture, and it saved them. I would say, too, that IBM was probably saved by their embracing Linux (another "tool" of hardware cross-compatability, by virtue of it's Open Source foundation).
Microsoft, however, continues to reject multiculturalism, cross compatability. They really screwed the pooch with Java, and they also fucked themselves by taking a cross-platform OS (NT, ran on x86, MIPS, and PPC, at one time - Proof: xBox 360 uses some of the PPC fork of NT), and their rejection of anything Open Source. And their last gasp of a power-play,
Re:End of the monopoly... (Score:3, Insightful)
It doesn't change my mind, though. From the Wikipedia article, I get the idea that Microsoft looked at Stacker, liked what it saw, and wrote its own implementation. I see nothing wrong with that. There is no mention of Microsoft using any of Stac's code. Yes, they infringed on Stac's patents, but it's not clear that this is because they copied ideas about how to do things or that they did a clean room implementation of disk compression, and that infringed on Stac's patents (that's what I have against patents).
Eventually, Stac couldn't survive by selling disk compression software, but that was a dying business anyway. As the article mentions, hard drives became cheaper and larger. I know nobody who uses Doublespace now, and few who did back in the day (I was one of them, though).
I think, if you want a more evil example, you should look at, e.g. Netscape vs. MSIE, where Microsoft bundled MSIE with the OS and played the embrace and extend game to lock people into MSIE, all but completely killing off competing browsers. Or Java, where MS shipped their own, incompatible VM, which I think is largely responsible for the failure of Java applets, and then they launched their own technology to compete with Java. Or WMA vs. Vorbis, where MS is pushing their own, proprietary, audio format, including it with the OS, and conveniently omitting Ogg Vorbis.
Still, I think, all in all, what Microsoft is doing is mostly good business sense, not intentional cruelty. They aren't stealing anything, nor are they killing people. No-one is forced to use their products, except perhaps when they willingly sign contracts to that effect. Microsoft aren't angels, but to call them evil, to me, seems like a dilution of the meaning of that word.