Allow me to be pedantic...

It was actually Citrix who "invented" the Windows Remote Desktop concept. Citrix licensed the Windows NT 3.X source code, and created a customized version they called Metaframe. They added support for running multiple interactive sessions, and had an abstraction layer for connecting keyboard/mouse/video to each session. Citrix created the ICA protocol for remote desktop. Microsoft bought back the rights for NT 4.X and created Windows Terminal Server (code name "Hydra"). Rather than use ICA, Microsoft created their own RDP protocol (which is loosely based on an obscure video conferencing protocol). Originally you could run both ICA and RDP on the same server; I'm not sure if that is still supported.

That is one perspective.

IMHO, for most Windows users running most Windows applications, remoting the entire desktop is usually the best experience.

Remoting individual applications, as with X over SSH, is a niche use case. Citrix could do this with ICA, but it wasn't used very often.

Note: The fact that you are reading /. means you are not in the "most Windows users" group. I'm not talking about you. :-)

Next, they'll require McDonalds to sell Big Mac combo meals for $2.50 to qualified low income customers.

I've got no love for ISP's, but where does this stop?

Using Azure, AWS, or any other cloud service isn't about saving money. At least not once you get to any sort of scale.You can almost always host it yourself for less.

What the cloud provides is flexibility. You can spin up additional resources on demand, and shut them down when no longer needed. You can get these resources in data centers all over the world.

Whether that flexibility is important enough to justify the added expense will depend on what you're doing.

This isn't how big companies like Microsoft work. The LinkedIn part of the business is organizationally distant from the Azure part of the business. There may not be any management in common until you reach the CEO level. Azure mind as well be a different company.

You also have to consider that LinkedIn started as a separate business. They already had significant IT infrastructure in place when Microsoft acquired them. The decision they're facing is not "should we use Azure?". The decision is "should we fix something that isn't broken?"

The reality is that Windows 10 contains enough API additions vs. Windows 7 that app developers have to give up stuff to remain compatible with Windows 7. Does tax software really need to use any of those API's? Probably not. But all it takes is one critical dependency that uses them, and the application is forced along for the ride.

Also, most developers simply don't want to deal with keeping applications running on older OS versions. It's a pain in the ass, and at some point there is no financial incentive to do it. Eventually most customers have moved on to the new OS.

FYI... Windows has used C++ in the kernel since at least NT 4.0, and the usage has increased over time. Public interfaces have remained C, but C++ is used in the implementation. To be fair, this is kernel-specific C++ code, not using STL or other C++ standard library things. I don't have a problem with that, but I know some people feel "It's not really C++ if I can't use STL".

There is no standard for C++ name mangling. It's really a platform-level decision, and whoever creates/owns the platform gets to define it. MS owns Windows, and got to define how mangling works there. GCC made different decisions, and their decisions got adopted by the POSIX world. Neither is right or wrong.

"When in Rome, do as the Romans do" applies. It's really up to GCC to do things the MS way on Windows, if they want to interoperate with the Windows ecosystem.

I understand that MS hasn't always provided complete/accurate/timely documentation on their C++ name mangling scheme. That does make interoperability very difficult. But let's be real here. Lack of proper documentation is a good excuse, but I don't believe for a second that's the reason GCC doesn't use MS C++ name mangling on Windows. They were never going to do that, especially back in the 90's when the decision was made.

"Hologram Man" by Cats In Space

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ld56R5DQKTc

Let’s welcome back the legend
But you can’t shake his hand
And we can see right through him
To his original backing band

Why are we digging up our heroes?
Are there no more superstars?
How I long for the days of Top of the Pops

He’s a m-m-m-m-money machine
Making more now he’s kicked the can
The tills are ringing
Everybody’s singing with the hologram man

He won’t get tired of playing
We’re selling out of merchandise
The golden goose keeps laying
And everybody gets a slice
And now they’re adding up the zeros
From their pseudo-superstar
How I long for the days of Top of the Pops

He’s a m-m-m-m-money machine
Making more now he’s kicked the can
The tills are ringing
Everybody’s singing with the hologram man

We keep the mega-dollar making machine
In a flight case in the van
The tills are singing
Everybody’s winning with the hologram man

[Instrumental]

Now you see him, now you don’t
Now you see him, now you don’t
Now you see him, now you don’t
Now you see him, now you don’t
Now you see him, now you don’t
Now you see him, now you don’t

He’s a m-m-m-m-money machine
Making more now he’s kicked the can
The tills are ringing
Everybody’s singing with the hologram man

We keep the mega-dollar making machine
In a flight case in the van
The tills are singing
Everybody’s winning with the hologram man

Now you see him, now you don’t
Now you see him, now you don’t
Ooh yeah
Now you see him, now you don’t
Now you see him, now you don’t
Can you see me?
Oh can you see me?
I’m gone

Not true!

Google for "rust removal" and you'll find all sorts of ways to make it go away. At least for a while. It takes constant vigilance to keep it away.

(For the record, I think Rust has valid uses cases. But for me, it's a painful solution to problems that don't bother me all that much. The cure is worse than the disease.)

What do the plaintiffs think Facebook should have done? Any answer that boils down to "have a human review everything" is simply not possible. It doesn't matter how badly you wish it were possible -- it isn't possible.

Oh, sorry, wrong answer, but thank you for playing.

Section 230 actually says the exact opposite. It explicitly allows sites to perform content moderation without that losing their liability protections.

A literal reading of the Sherman Antitrust Act can lead one to that conclusion, however the courts have interpreted the act more narrowly. Antitrust is complicated. I see a lot of lawsuits filed that claim antitrust violations, but see very few succeeding on that basis. I think Ruble has a steep hill to climb here.

Sorry, it doesn't work that way. I wish it did, but it doesn't.

Lawsuits with no hope of success are filed all the time. They are filed for other reasons, such as for generating publicity.

Here's the part of the Wikipedia article you forgot to quote:

Google ranking YouTube results ahead of competitors is not "tying". It may be legally actionable for other reasons, but it's not tying.

Personally, I think complaints about Google search results are going to have a hard time in US courts. Search results are an opinion, and Google has a first amendment right to express their opinion. It is fundamentally the job of all search engines to form an opinion about which links are more important than others, and sort the results accordingly. Completely "neutral" search results would be useless.

Any use of "Microsoft" and "force" in the same sentence always sets off alarm bells in my head. Having said that, anything that helps kill IE is a Good Thing.