Sounds like a scene from the first episode of Torchwood. In fact, the whole story sounds like a failed pilot TV show.

My favorite quote from the story:

Documents magically being deleted at hyperspeed, other documents planted "deep in the operating system"... yeah, right.

First of all, I agree with the general thread that the Windows 8 GUI had no business being on a server. Heck; even Server 2008 R2 had all the chrome turned off and ran as close to NT4 as it possibly could.

But removing all the "advanced" stuff? Like what, precisely? If it's a DC, all the normal DC stuff is there (buried under the "Manage this server" nonsense). Because I can remember setting up NT4 and needing to specify IRQ and base settings for things like network cards. Back in the day, it was easier to install Windows 95 and let it autodiscover all the hardware settings, note them down and then install NT. I'm really happy to see those "advanced" settings gone and things "simplified".

As far as editing group policy, I don't know there is a way to simplify that. There are just so many policies that can be set Microsoft have (wisely) left "simplifying" that area alone (although I wish I could search through group policies for the setting I want).

You just reminded me about that.

I looked in my Build 9680. There, in all it's annoying pop-out glory and quite tasteful shadow (but minus any discernible windows border) is the Environmental Variables window in all it's NT 3.1 glory!

Visio charts, Project Gantt charts, Excel charts... it's actually a very useful technology, especially if you're pulling data from a live source (eg. query data into Excel, which generates charts). Much easier than querying the data in Excel, updating the graph, exporting (or copying) the graph as PNG then updating the PowerPoint.

... and if the one rendering engine was used, the moment an exploit becomes available, all systems are vulnerable. Haven't we learned about the dangers of monocultures yet?

So take the PC Settings screen, then. Just by looking at it, how are you supposed to know if something is a group label, text or button? You don't; you have to go discover that by mouse-over etc. Now granted, it's not the definitive screen in Metro, but to my eye it highlight's the problem with the OS: too much flatness.

Windows 3 had a flat look, but with enough screen hints as to what to do. The toolbars (circa Word 6 / Windows 95) were brilliant in that respect; it was really obvious what to do. But the progressive flattening from Office 2007 onwards into Windows 8 has, again to my eye, gone too far.

In what way?

I currently have my Windows 7 laptop in a multimonitor configuration running quite happily, and an identical Windows 8 laptop in an identical configuration, and both work equally well. Sure, there's some software that doesn't play nice with multimonitor, but that's the software, not the OS.

But that's special pleading.

FOSS is supposed to be an alternative to stuff put out by big companies; why is it suddenly incumbent upon them to be fixing security holes 20+ years old?

Offer every hacker 70 unactivated Windows 8 licenses to return to Microsoft for a refund?

Come to NJ and walk around west of the I-95 at night.

Umm... the date of the article was April 1, 2013.

This was a satire piece from 18 months ago. Names made up etc.

Windows, since XP, has had this ability. You needed a SysInternals tool to enable it. But, finally, a welcome addition.

And that, my friend, is the great tragedy that is Windows 8. Underneath the flawed user interface is the best Windows NT system ever. Considering what it does, it uses less memory, is more stable, runs faster and is downright better than any Windows before.

From InfoWorld, April 1, 2013:

If you've been looking forward to Windows 9, the OS that will fix what Windows 8 got wrong, you're in for a surprise: There will be no Windows 9. Instead, Microsoft announced it will proceed directly to Windows 10.

"The Windows 9 internal beta was a phenomenal success," said Microsoft PR rep Cheryl Tunt. "I mean, it blew Windows 8 out of the water, and as we all know, Windows 8 is nigh flawless. After discussion at the C level, Microsoft has decided it will not mess with success and will leave Windows 9 exactly as it is. As such, work is now getting under way on Windows 10, which should see a public release."

http://www.infoworld.com/artic...

I never said the Sun was a first generation star. I said it was a Population I star (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metallicity#Population_I_stars)

Huge difference.

From Wikipedia:
Population I, or metal-rich stars, are young stars with the highest metallicity out of all three populations. The Earth's Sun is an example of a metal-rich star. These are common in the spiral arms of the Milky Way galaxy.

Population II, or metal-poor stars, are those with relatively little metal.

Population III, or metal-free stars, are a hypothetical extinct population of extremely massive and hot stars with virtually no surface metals, except for a small quantity of metals formed in the Big Bang, such as lithium-7. These stars are believed to have been formed in the early universe. Their existence is inferred from cosmology, but they have not yet been observed directly.

You are aware that the sun is a Population I star, aren't you? Meaning it's a very young star?